Hands Off 
MEXICO 

r>v • • • • • 

1^ y • • • • • 

John Kenneth Turner 

oAuthor o/ Barbarous Mexico 




'^ew York 
THE RAND SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCE 



Hands Off 
Mexico 






"By 
JOHN KENNETH TURNER 

(Author of Barbarous Mexico) 




The Case Against Intervention. 
The Intervention Conspiracy. 
Wilson and Intervention. 
A Solution for the Mexican "Problem. 



''N^TjD York 
THE RAND SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCE 



tl 



7 3^ 



.T^5 



■ 198 

Copyright 

Rand School of Social Science 

7 East 15th Street 

New York 

1920 




©CI.A5G5n05 



FEB 2 



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Hands Off Mexico 



I. 

FOREWORD 

Our next armed expedition in force into Mexico is almost 
certain to result in formal war on both sides, followed by an 
effort at complete subjugation. The General Staff of the 
United States Army has been quoted as estimating that it will 
take 450,000 men three and one-half years to pacify Mexico. 
General Staffs are usually optimistic in judging their own capa- 
city for conquest. 

We shall not only have a war abroad indefinitely, but an 
indefinite prolongation of war conditions at home. We shall 
again have conscription, bond issues, and every other form of 
sacrifice and repression to which the public has been subjected 
during the past three years. American militarism and espionage 
will become chronic. Reaction will be more firmly seated in the 
saddle than ever before. 

There can be no more important issue than the issue of 
war with Mexico; for all other issues are tied up with it. The 
forces of progress will have to gather swift strength or they will 
feel the crunch of the Iron Heel. The disaster to America will 
hardly be less than that to Mexico. 



Intervention in Mexico has been determined upon by Wall 
Street and the Wilson Administration. The plan is to put it over 
before the forces working for real democracy, disorganized dur- 
ing the war and still on the defensive, have had a period of legal 
peace in which to reorganize and expose the crimes of the past.* 

Although the intervention conspiracy is an inevitable result 
of recent events, its success is not inevitable. There is a fighting 
chance to frustrate it. The longer it can be postponed the 
greater the probability of its ultimate failure. 

The immediate success of the intervention conspiracy de- 
pends largely upon the present tremendous effort to manufacture 
and mobilize public opinion for the purpose, through the dissem- 
ination of false statements regarding conditions in Mexico, the 
character of the Mexican Government, the relations between 
the United States and Mexico, and the obligations of the Amer- 
ican people in the circumstances. 

The case for intervention is entirely without merit. The 
motives of the conspiracy are purely financial. There is a prac- 
ticable and honorable solution for the so-called Mexican problem 
not involving intervention. 

This pamphlet is an effort to sketch the more important 
details. 

If the Wilson Administration can be shown to be a party 
to the intervention conspiracy, it would seem to be obvious that 
it would then be the most dangerous factor therein. For such 



* January 22, (1920), we were informed that the Mexican Government had offered 
to grant temporary permits for the resumption of drilHng upon oil wells already begun 
and that the oil corporations had accepted the offer. This does not mean that there has 
been a settlement of the controversj'. The statements of both Carranza and of his 
Secretary of Finance, Cabrera, indicate that there is no intention of abandoning Article 
27, but that the "temporary relief" is intended only until the Mexican Congress enacts 
the petroleum law enforcing the constitutional provision. By this concession Carranza 
pulls the teeth of the oil shortage scare, staged in this country for the sole purpose of 
manufacturing pro-intervention sentiment. It is only another evidence of his determina- 
tion to avoid war at all costs short of relinquishing Mexican sovereignty and the economic 
program of the revolution. That Carranza has not surrendered to Wall Street is evi- 
denced by the fact that the interventionists have not abated their propaganda or their 
plots. Except for a partial relief of the immediate tension, the situation remains (Feb- 
ruary, 1920) as described in this pamphlet. — J. K. T. 



a conspiracy could never attain its object without the active 
cooperation of the executive branch of the Government. The 
oil companies cannot themselves and an American army into 
Mexico. Nor can the American press. Nor can a handful of 
Republican and Democratic politicians. 

If war comes between the United States and Mexico within 
any near period it will almost surely come, not by any deliberate 
choice of the American people, or even of their duly elected rep- 
resentatives, but only as a sequel to clashes with Mexican Gov- 
ernment forces, after American forces have invaded Mexico in 
a "punitive expedition," to ''protect American lives and prop- 
erty," or under some other pretext, by order of the Executive. 
The only part Congress is likely to play will be to legalize an 
accomplished fact. 

In any event. Congress will not take any decisive action not 
thoroughly approved by the Executive. Even if the League of 
Nations takes cognizance of the matter, it will only be to sanc- 
tify a program first determined upon by the Government of the 
United States. The real choice of time, place, and action, will 
rest with the President. 

Any adequate consideration of the intervention plot, there- 
fore, must include an inquiry into the extent to which the Admin- 
istration has revealed a willingness to serve the purposes of the 
persons and interests seeking intervention. 



2. 

SOURCE OF THE CONSPIRACY 

The parties to the conspiracy, insofar as they include finan- 
cial and industrial interests, are identified by the published 
membership of the National Association for the Protection of 
American Rights in Mexico. In this organization is represented 
America's richest banking, mining, and industrial corporations, 



headed by J. P. Morgan & Co., the National City Bank, Standard 
Oil, the Mexican Petroleum Company, the Intercontinental Rub- 
ber Company; and the Phelps-Dodge, Greene-Cannanea, and 
other components of the Morgan-Ryan-Guggenheim Copper 
Trust. These are also the richest corporations having a stake 
in Mexico. 

Every member of the National Association for the Protec- 
tion of American Rights in Mexico presumably approves of its 
work and shares responsibility for it. Although this organization 
has stated, on occasion, that it does not seek intervention, an 
examination of its literature proves this to be an equivocation. 
It asks for "protection" of a sort that the existing Mexican 
Government has never been willing to grant. In asking for 
"protection" of the American Government and the American 
people, it implies that it does not expect to procure such "pro- 
tection" from the Mexican Government, except through the 
application of external force, or the threat of force. Intervention, 
as defined in international law, is interference by one govern- 
ment in the affairs of another, either by the use of force or the 
threat of force ; it is effective intervention exactly to the extent to 
which the affairs of the invaded or threatened nation are influ- 
enced or controlled by such invasion or threats. The Bulletin 
of the National Association for the Protection of American 
Rights in Mexico itself prints open appeals for the use of force 
in Mexico, and editorially expresses approval of such appeals. 
This organization, and the Association of Oil Producers of 
Mexico, a sub-division of it, between them, admit refusal of their 
members to comply with Mexican laws, boast of defiance of the 
authority of the Mexican Government, admit the support of an in- 
surgent army upon Mexican soil as a means to defying such authority. 

The hostile situation between members of these organiza- 
tions and the Mexican Government, as portrayed by the press 
matter of the former, is one that obviously cannot long be main- 
tained. Either the oil operators will control the Mexican Gov- 
ernment, or the Mexican Government will control the oil 



operators, at least insofar as the immediate issues between them 
are concerned. 

The Mexican Government is going to succeed in asserting 
its sovereignty, or it is going to fail to do so. One side or the 
other will have to yield. The oil operators acknowledge that 
they will choose intervention in preference to yielding. No 
essential fact is lacking to prove that Wall Street seeks interven- 
tion except a straightforward confession that the word "inter- 
vention" fits the thing that it seeks. 

Wall Street is apparently not yet ready to make such a 
confession. It is afraid of the word. Public opinion is not yet 
sufficiently mobilized to look with complacence upon the sinister 
circumstances which the word implies. Meanwhile, an important 
fraction of the American press industriously agitates for the act 
itself, while a number of Senators and Congressmen have joined 
the chorus from the floors of their respective Houses. Interven- 
tion by any other name will smell as sweet to the Mexican oil 
king. In view of the fact that publications and politicians who 
attack Mexico nowadays do not suggest any remedy except 
intervention, that, indeed, the remedies they suggest invariably 
involve some form of intervention, all present attacks upon 
Mexico or the Mexican Government may fairly be termed pro- 
intervention propaganda. 

Pro-intervention propaganda we have always had with us, 
but never, before the organization of the National Association 
for the Protection of American Rights in Mexico, in January, 
1919, has it been so voluminous, so undisguised and aggressive ; 
never before was it possible to establish its source beyond ques- 
tion. The assertions and arguments of both press and politicians 
are an echo of those of the National Association for the Protec- 
tion of American Rights in Mexico. Although a part of the press 
propaganda can be traced directly to this organization, it is not 
necessary so to trace it in order to establish the position of the 
press in the conspiracy. Anyone who has read the Pujo Com- 
mittee report upon the Money Trust, showing the concentra- 



tion of credit in the hands of three great banks, and the control 
of small banks by the big ones — and anyone who appreciates the 
dependence of the more powerful organs of the press upon the 
dominant business interests of the communities which they serve, 
and especially upon the banks — will understand how a large 
fraction of the press is easily induced to assist in any course of 
publicity medicine which Wall Street decides shall be adminis- 
tered to the country. 

Has word gone out from Wall Street to raise a concerted 
outcry against Mexico, as a means to manufacturing a public 
opinion that will lend itself to intervention? 

An indictment of the American press in general is a serious 
matter. Unfortunately, in the present instance the indictment 
is easily sustainable. I do not consider that the mere demand 
for intervention is of itself sufficient to establish the conspiracy 
charge. The indictment rests, rather, upon the dissemination 
of statements known to be false. 

In other words, if the current attacks upon Mexico are well 
substantiated and the suggested remedy justifiable, then the 
conspiracy charge must fall. But if they are built upon false- 
hood we have a conspiracy, and of a most sinister character. 
Either intervention is a defensible policy or it is not. If it is 
defensible, the demand for it does not need to be supported by 
lies. If, on the other hand, the intervention propaganda is found 
to consist largely of misinformation, then the interventionists 
and their cause stand self-convicted at the very start. 

3. 

INTERVENTIONIST LIES 

Many of the reports that are employed to bolster up the 
interventionist cause are not immediately capable of proof or 
disproof, but enough of them are to establish the fact that the 
foundations of the interventionist structure is worm-eaten with 
falsehood. 

8 



First, we have a group of assertions calculated to instil the 
idea that Mexicans, and particularly the Mexican Government, 
are hostile to Americans and the American Government — which 
would naturally produce a corresponding hostility on the part 
of Americans against Mexico. We are told that Mexicans have 
an especial hatred for Americans, that they believe we are afraid 
to fight them, that they imagine they could defeat us in war, 
that the attitude of the Mexican Government toward the Amer- 
ican Government is one of insolence, that Mexico was unneutral 
and assisted Germany during the war, even that President Car- 
ranza has at various times planned a military invasion of the 
United States for the purpose of conquering American territory. 

Second, we have a group of assertions calculated to create 
the impression that the present Mexican Government is incap- 
able ever of establishing order in Mexico — which would naturally 
tend to allay opposition to a program looking toward the estab- 
lishment of order by the strong arm of the United States. Every 
allegation touching the weakness, unpopularity, or general de- 
pravity of the Mexican Government falls into this class. In 
particular we are told that the greater part of Mexico is under 
control of the enemies of Carranza, even that a large proportion 
of the Mexican people would welcome intervention by the United 
States. 

Consider briefly the first group of assertions. While it may 
be presumptuous to profess to see into the mind of the Mexican 
President, we have the facts that the President of the United 
States twice sent an army into Mexico for a period of months, 
and that Carranza avoided a conflict ; that American forces have 
repeatedly invaded Mexico for shorter periods, each invasion 
constituting an act of war, but that the Mexican Government 
refrained from declaring war against the United States; that 
Carranza has received a number of notes from the Government 
of the United States of so threatening a nature that 
they could hardly fail to provoke war with any government not 
intent on avoiding war at almost any cost, but that Carranza has 
never replied in kind. Even laymen are well aware that a war 
of aggression has a much better chance of success if staged as a 
war of defense. The Mexican Government has had a number of 
opportunities to engage in a war of defense against the United 
States, but it has in every instance passed the opportunity by. 



These undeniable circumstances place the tale of a Carranza 
plot to invade the United States in the category of a deliberate 
fabrication. The insolence story is equally groundless. As to 
Mexico assisting Germany in the late war, it is obvious that 
Mexico was not in a position to give assistance. Although since 
early in 1917 we have been repeatedly told that Carranza prac- 
ticed an unneutrality favorable to Germany, not a particle of 
serious evidence has been brought forward to support the charge. 
We have the sworn testimony of our Ambassador to Mexico 
that he knows of no such evidence. (House Rules Committee 
Investigation, July 22, 1919.) 

As to any one in any position of authority in Mexico imag- 
ining that we are afraid of them, or that they can whip us, the 
evidence is overwhelmingly against this view. The charge, in- 
deed, is in flat contradiction with another charge, coming from 
the same source, that the Mexicans hate us. For hate is the child 
of fear; if the Mexicans hate us, it is because they fear us, not, 
because they think they can whip us. It is in contradiction withj 
another assertion, also from the same source, that the Mexicans 
would welcome intervention. If they would welcome interven- 
tion, would it not be, rather, because they loved us, instead of 
because they hated us? 

Coming down to our second group of assertions, how can 
it be said that rebels or bandits control a greater part of Mexico, 
when it is admitted (as it has to be and is admitted) that they do 
not control any railroad, any sea or land port, any State capital, 
any large city or town, in any part of the Republic, and when 
the Carranza Administration is in possession of all of these, and 
is discharging the functions of government in every State and 
city? 

While no plebiscite has been taken to determine whether 
Mexicans would or would not welcome intervention, an ordinary 
appreciation of human nature and human history is sufficient to 
furnish a pretty confident answer to that question. The impulse 
of human kind everywhere is toward self-government, not to- 
ward subjection to others. No nation in the past has ever 
chosen or desired to be governed by another one. Nor has any 
alien people ever shown itself satisfied to be ruled by the United 
States. Although, after conquering the Filipinos with the sword, 
we imposed, at vast expense, a system of education whose pri- 

10 



mary object was to convince the Filipino youth of the advan- 
tages of American rule, one generation has passed and gone, 
another has come, and the Filipino people are still pleading for 
self-determination. The Mexican people sacrificed thousands of 
lives to free themselves from Spain, and again thousands to save 
themselves from subjection to a dynasty sought to be imposed 
by France. Whether the Mexicans love us or whether they hate 
us, there is no reason to believe that any important fraction of 
the Mexican nation would approve of any form of American 
meddling in Mexican affairs. 

The above, of course, does not cover the entire range of the 
interventionist propaganda. Nor does it cover the easily prov- 
able lies. These are merely sample lies that happen to be lies 
on their face. If the falsity of essential propositions like these 
is so easily discernible, the public may well suspect all reports 
emanating from the same quarter, whether immediately capable 
of disproof or not — tales of atrocities, disorders, dissensions, 
immoralities, or confiscations ; statements as to the real causes 
of such disorders as exist, of the issues between the oil men and 
the Mexican Government, and of the obligations of the Amer- 
ican people in the premises. 

A further examination will show that the interventionist 
propaganda as a whole is composed largely of misstatements, 
and that it is the misstatements alone that seem to support the 
justice of the policy proposed. 

4. 

AMERICAN LIVES NOT THE ISSUE 

Every report of disorder, maladministration, destitution, 
confiscation, murder, or other outrage, and especially every one 
in which Americans figure as sufferers, is nowadays used to 
impress upon the conscience of the people the proposition that 
we are in some way obligated to send armed forces into Mexico 
to "straighten out" affairs there. 

Although any form of misgovernment or suffering any- 
where is to be deplored, it does not follow that the remedy pro- 
posed in this instance would be just, effective, or in any way 
defensible. 

11 



We are told that we must send an army into Mexico to 
protect American lives. One answer to this is that such a course 
would not protect American lives, but would sacrifice them. Not 
only would the lives of Americans now in Mexico be in greater 
danger than ever before, but there is every reason to expect that 
far more Americans would fall in battle than the total number 
of Americans now resident in that country. 

Another answer is that Americans are now reasonably safe 
in Mexico, and always have been. The existing Mexican Gov- 
ernment does not kill Americans nor incite its people to do so. 
Considering our various invasions, the absence of anti-American 
riots is nothing short of amazing. Some Americans have been 
killed, nearly all of them by outlaws in isolated districts where 
they persisted in going, sometimes against the advice of the 
Mexican Government and even of the American Government. 

The list of Americans killed in Mexico in a period of nearly 
nine years, made public by our Ambassador in July (1919), 
totaled only 225. This number includes members of our mili- 
tary forces killed during our various invasions. It includes 
Americans who were members of Mexican rebel forces. It in- 
cludes Americans who were killed by American citizens. It 
includes Americans who were killed presumably by members of 
a rebel force that was paid and supported by American oil cor- 
porations. It includes Americans murdered in a rage by a bandit 
leader who had been supported and then abandoned by the 
present Administration. 

During these same years the murders of Americans, 
Mexicans, and other "nationals" in our own country run into the 
thousands. They include over four hundred lynchings, a number 
of bloody race riots, and numerous homicides committed for the 
sake of robbery. They include a far greater number of Mexicans 
killed by Americans than the number of Americans killed in the 
same period in Mexico. 

Following the Villa raid, in 1916, uncounted numbers of 
peaceful, unoffending, and defenseless Mexicans, many of them 
small farmers on the American side of the border, were mur- 
dered by border rangers, local police officers, or others intent 
upon ''making the Mexicans pay for Villa's raid," or "making 
this a white man's country." According to a report of an inves- 
tigator appointed by Colonel H. J. Slocum, U. S. A., rendered 

12 



February 12, 1918, "the number of victims thus sacrificed in south- 
west Texas by such peace officers assuming the powers of a court of 
justice will probably never be known, though I understand that Attor- 
ney F. C. Pierce holds a list with names of nearly three hundred." 
This report was printed in full in the April, 1918, Mexican Re- 
view, published at Washington, D. C. 

So long as we do not fully protect Mexican lives in Amer- 
ican territory, how can we insist that Mexico fully protect 
American lives in Mexican territory? 

So long as we are incapable of fully protecting American 
lives in American territory, how can we expect to be able to 
protect American lives in Mexican territory ? 

The way to protect American lives is to protect them, and 
not to sacrifice them. What the interventionists are asking us 
to do is to sacrifice American lives, under the pretext of pro- 
tecting them. It is obvious that the interventionists cannot be 
concerned for American lives as such, that the protection of 
American lives is not the real issue. 

What, then, is the real issue? Is it PRINCIPLE? Is it 
the principle that America is bound to use its armed forces to 
protect the lives of American citizens IN OTHER COUN- 
TRIES, regardless of the measure of our ability to protect them 
at home under all conditions? 

Every effort is being made to impress the public with this 
view. Like every other pro-intervention argument, it will not 
bear examination. If we assume this obligation for ourselves we 
would have to concede the right of our neighbors to assume it 
on behalf of their citizens. Would we concede the right of Italy 
to send an army into Pennsylvania to protect striking Italians 
from being murdered by Steel Trust guards and gunmen? 

To do so would be to abandon American sovereignty. It is 
a function of government in the United States to protect the 
lives of foreigners as well as citizens here to the best of its 
ability. It is a function of government in Mexicp to protect the 
lives of foreigners as well as citizens there to the best of its 
ability. No government on earth perfectly discharges this func- 
tion. If one government happens, for a period, to discharge it a 
little better than a neighbor, that does not give it a right to 
extend its authority to the territory of the neighbor, 

13 



It is, however, a question whether Mexican lives are safer 
in Texas than American lives are in Mexico. Certainly there are 
other countries in which Americans are habitually safer than 
foreigners are in the United States. It is an immoral rule that 
does not work both ways. As we are bound to maintain our own 
sovereignty, so are we bound, by every consideration of interna- 
tional law and ethics, scrupulously to respect the sovereignty of 
our neighbors. 

We have no right whatever to go in and kill a lot of Mexi- 
cans because some Americans have unfortunately been killed. 
We possess no super-authority which makes us the judge as to 
whether the Mexican Government is using its best efforts to 
protect Americans. If an American citizen is determined to 
remain in dangerous places, he must seek other means of pro- 
tection than an army of his countrymen. He has rights, but no 
right to call an invading army to his assistance. No right of 
any American in Mexico can weigh against the right of the 
Mexican people to sovereignty. 

Nor can it weigh against the right of the American people 
to be kept out of war. For the rights of Mexicans in this matter 
happen to accord both with the rights and INTERESTS of the 
American people. To attempt to live by the principle that our 
government is bound to protect the life of every American in 
every part of the world would be to assert a world sovereignty 
for ourselves, and involve our country in constant and disastrous 
war. The most aggressive government on earth does not at- 
tempt to live consistently up to this principle. Its actual appli- 
cation is urged only on occasions when a pretext is needed for 
aggression. The obligation, both of interest and of honor, is 
overwhelmingly against sending an army to "protect American 
lives" in Mexico. 

5. 

"BENEVOLENT PACIFICATION" 

American citizens have had a long time in which to save 
their lives by getting out of dangerous parts of Mexico. Why 
do they remain there? Only one answer has ever been heard to 
this question : They remain there for business reasons. In this 
answer is acknowledged the real issue. 

14 



For business reasons, there are Americans who are not only- 
willing to risk the lives of their employees, and sometimes of 
themselves, but also the lives of thousands of other Americans 
who would be sent to "protect" them. It is impossible to deny 
this fact. It is good and sufficient explanation of the phenomenon 
that the fountain-head of the interventionist propaganda is not 
some humanitarian or charitable institution, but an association 
of banking, mining, and other corporations whose sole reason 
for being is to make money for themselves. 

Of course the gentlemen who speak for this association put 
forward a variety of arguments intended to convince the public 
that their own business interests in this matter is also the inter- 
est of the public, even the interest of the Mexican people and of 
humanity. Otherwise there would be scant hope of ever realiz- 
ing their program. 

We are assured, variously, that we could and would "restore 
order" in Mexico, "clean up" the bandits and grafters, give the 
Mexicans good government, and improve their economic condi- 
tions; that, anyhow, Mexico is "our job under the Monroe Doc- 
trine," and if we do not compel Mexico to discharge her 
"international obligations" England or some other country will 
do so, involving us in trouble with the latter; that Mexico is in 
danger of falling under the control of Germany or Japan, which 
would constitute a menace to our own safety. Cuba is held up 
as a shining example of how we might set up a "stable govern- 
ment" of natives and then unselfishly withdraw. Finally, we are 
told that the general welfare is somehow bound up in the private 
interests of Americans abroad, and that we are under obligation 
to protect those interests at whatever cost either to Mexicans or 
to ourselves. 

All of such arguments are based upon misapprehensions of 
one kind or another ; all are fallacious. 

Regarding the assertion that we could restore order in 
Mexico, one answer to this is that the disorder in Mexico has 
been greatly exaggerated. Another answer is that we have not 
yet satisfactorily worked out the task of maintaining order at 
home, and the difficulties of keeping order in a foreign country 
would be infinitely greater. Still another answer is that past 
efforts we have made to restore order in other countries have not 
been a brilliant success. 

15 



Our ability to restore order in Mexico would depend largely 
upon the sort of welcome we would receive from the Mexicans. 
If our efforts were resented and opposed — as they certainly would 
be — it is obvious that there would at once be a great deal more 
disorder than ever before. We would have a war on our hands 
to begin with, and after that a condition of ''banditry" infinitely 
more aggravated than the present one.. For every Mexican pa- 
triot would turn "bandit." 

The experience of the present and of the past is against any 
theory that we could "restore order" within any reasonable 
period. We sent an expedition in force to "catch Villa." It 
returned unsuccessful at the end of eleven months and only after 
the expenditure of $100,000,000 of the people's money. American 
forces have been fighting, unlawfully, to "restore order" in Haiti 
ever since July, 1915, and in Santo Domingo ever since May, 
1916, but order is far from restored in either. If we are incapable 
of "ending banditry" with the iron heel in these countries, how 
can we expect to succeed in a similar efifort in Mexico, whose 
power of resistance is incomparably greater? 

Between the Cuba of 1898 and the Mexico of 1920 there is 
no fair basis of comparison. We went into Cuba with the con- 
sent of the Cubans, who were persuaded of our unselfish sym- 
pathy for Cuban independence. We would go into Mexico with 
the opposition of the Mexicans, who could only view our action 
as an efifort to destroy their independence. 

We have indulged in much self-praise of our "unselfish" 
Cuban record, but there is nothing unselfish about it. For we 
never relinquished control of Cuba, nor permitted the Cubans 
to enjoy the independence for which they fought. Although in 
the end we withdrew our army, we refused to withdraw it until 
the Cubans had revised their Constitution, ceding the United 
States a portion of their territory and acknowledging our "right" 
to intervene at will. Today we hold Cuba in political and eco- 
nomic subjection. 

Nevertheless, our Cuban record is a fairer record than our 
Philippine record, our Haitien record, our Santo Domingan 
record, or our Nicaraguan record. The evidence is all against 
the theory that we could do as well in Mexico. 

We are told that we could "set up a stable government" 
without a war of conquest. But if the Mexicans would resist, 

16 



how could we set up any kind of a government until after a war 
of conquest? 

Having set up our stable government, by what means would 
we maintain it except the continuous application of the same 
measures by which we had set it up? 

The government that we would set up in Mexico, whether 
administered by Mexicans or by Americans, would, naturally, 
be a government designed to suit ourselves— that is, to suit the 
political and military leaders who would have "the job" in hand, 
and especially the financial interests which furnished the motive 
for the enterprise. The theory that we could at once withdraw 
is based on the assumption that this kind of a government would 
also suit the Mexicans. If the Mexicans wanted that kind of a 
government, it is probable that they would have already estab- 
lished it themselves — and the present friction would not exist. 

As has been seen, one of the stock assertions of the interven- 
tion propaganda is that the Mexicans do not want the govern- 
ment that they have at present. The more the propaganda is 
examined the more vital this proposition is found to be in the 
interventionist scheme, so many others hinge upon it. If this 
proposition falls, a very large part of the interventionist struc- 
ture goes into a state of collapse. 

A conclusive answer to it is found in the history of the rise 
to power of the present government and its perpetuation. The 
Carranza party attained its dominating position not suddenly 
and by a military coup, but slowly, superseding a government 
which had come into possession of the military and financial 
resources of the country. It survived plots and counter-plots, 
personal revolts and counter-revolutions heavily backed by 
money and influence beyond the border. It rose triumphant in 
spite of the persistent enmity of influential foreigners, and the 
unfriendly meddling of foreign governments. 

Carranza personally was never a military hero nor a brilliant 
orator ; he is advanced in years ; he wears whiskers ; he was con- 
nected with the old regime. These circumstances would invali- 
date any theory that the present government achieved success 
on the personality of its leader. Why, then, did it succeed over 
Huerta, Villa, Felix Diaz, Zapata, and all the rest? 

The interventionist reply is that Carranza owes his tenure 
to the favor of Wilson. This is one of the commonest of the 

17 



interventionist lies and one of the most easily provable as such, 
as will be demonstrated in due course. The present Mexican 
Government is certainly far more acceptable to the Mexican 
people than any government foreigners might set up. Having 
overthrown the present government, therefore, and having set 
up our "stable government," what would become of the latter 
the moment we attempted to withdraw? It would either fall or 
it would find a revolution on its hands. It would prove to be 
unstable. We could insure its stability only by remaining and 
supporting it with arms. 

Once it is admitted that the present government and its 
policies would be preferred to the substitute that we would at- 
tempt to impose, or that any considerable fraction of the Mexi- 
can people would for any reason resent our interference, it must 
also be admitted that nothing short of a protracted military 
occupation, accompanied by ruthless warfare against the party 
now dominant, and against all other nationalistic or patriotic 
elements, would be required before we would be able to assert 
the authority that we would have to assert in order to carry out 
any program of "rehabilitation" that is advocated. 

The idea that we could "set up a stable government" in 
Mexico and then withdraw is a delusion. The idea that we could 
remain and establish a regime that would benefit the Mexican 
people is equally a delusion. It is hardly beneficial to a country 
to kill thousands of its most intelligent and progressive citizens, 
which would certainly be done. 

Nor is there any reason to believe that the government we 
would impose would be any more honest, democratic, or in any 
way more beneficent than the government that we would over- 
throw. 

The governments that we set up in Haiti and Santo Domingo 
are military despotisms. There is no freedom of speech or of 
the press, no political liberty of any kind. 

In Nicaragua, which we have absolutely controlled since 
1912, conditions are quite as bad. We essayed to set up a "stable 
government" in this "sister Republic." The only way we have 
found to keep it "stable" is to keep the population forever under 
our guns. Under our beneficent rule the Nicaraguans have no 
freedom of expression, no political liberty of any sort. The 

18 



Nicaraguan elections, as "supervised" by American forces, are 
as much a farce as the elections staged in Mexico in the darkest 
days of the Diaz despotism. 

Americans governed Vera Cruz for seven months, but they 
did not give the Mexicans a free press. General Funston sup- 
pressed Mexican newspapers in Vera Cruz. 

We have not given self-government to Porto Rico or the 
Virgin Islands. In 1917 we landed forces in Cuba to support a 
government that had perpetuated itself by fraud. 

A prominent American, in urging the righteousness of our 
Haitien adventure, declared : "What those people need more 
than anything else is for us to teach them honest government." 

During the regime of Roosevelt, we forced an American 
Receivership of customs upon the sovereign Republic of Santo 
Domingo. Soon after Wilson became President, a Senatorial 
investigation revealed a scandalous situation in which American 
politicians, in league with American bankers and concessionaires, 
were preying upon Santo Domingan finances by virtue of polit- 
ical control exerted under the terms of the customs Convention. 

Our government of Mexico during the period of conquest 
and "rehabilitation" would be in the hands of military men, con- 
suls, and carpet-baggers. It would be a Czaristic bureaucracy, 
the greater part of its energies devoted to the putting down dis- 
order by more violent counter disorder. 

Such a government might dole out a certain amount of 
charity, but it would not voluntarily lay the foundations for the 
economic betterment of the masses. If we intervened in Mexico 
our first concern would be to "protect American property," and 
to advance "American interests," not to benefit the Mexicans. 
Indeed, our chief complaint against the present government is 
that it is attempting to administer Mexico for the Mexicans, a 
policy that is alleged to conflict with American property 
interests. 

Of course, the absence of turmoil, and the resumption of 
industry on a normal scale, are necessary prerequisites to any 
general improvement of economic conditions. But I will show 
that purely selfish interference on our part is largely respon- 
sible for the continuation of the turmoil. The interventionist 
pretense of consideration for the welfare of the Mexican people 
is sheer hypocrisy. 

19 



THE JAPANESE AND GERMAN BUGABOOS 

Is intervention defensible, then, on grounds of national self- 
interest? 

In this connection the German and Japanese perils and the 
Monroe Doctrine are the first to bob up. 

In the half dozen years before the United States became a 
military ally of Japan a long series of newspaper hoaxes, in which 
the Japanese were represented as plotting for economic and 
political subjugation of Mexico, was perpetrated upon the Amer- 
ican public. We heard of huge economic concessions, land colo- 
nization on a large scale, naval bases, secret alliances, the 
shipping of Japanese soldiers to Mexico, the recruiting of Ja- 
panese in the Mexican army, Japanese military plans for an 
attack upon America from Mexican territory. 

Reports of this character were invariably utilized to engen- 
der distrust and hatred of Mexico and to manufacture sentiment 
in favor of grabbing that country "before it is too late." Few 
of the newspapers which circulated them would now attempt to 
maintain that they were anything but lies. 

For three years past we have had a similar propaganda with 
Germany represented as the Peril. The purpose is obviously the 
same, and the stories are equally v^^ithout a foundation of fact. 
The National Association for the Protection of American Rights 
in Mexico itself openly stands sponsor for a series of "revela- 
tions" by a former military spy, Altendorf. The veracity of 
Altendorf's employers, and of the interventionist press in gen- 
eral, may be guaged by a few quotations from articles which were 
recently given wide publicity. 

"Within six months after tJie United Stales ratifies the treaty of 
peace Germany will have complete economic control of Mexico." 

"Within a very few years, if they are permitted to carry out the 
plans they have formulated and are now executing as rapidly as they 
can, the Germans will have absolute economic, political, and military 
control of Latin-America with headquarters in Mexico. Then they will 
be ready to attempt once more the realization of their dream of world 
conquest." 

"Dr. Altendorf asserted that Carranza had been bitterly disappointed 
by the failure of the plan to invade the United States in 1918, when he 

20 



hoped to win back Texas, Arizona, California, and New Mexico. He 
said that the defeat of Germany had not ahered the attitude of Carranza 
and that, through the good offices of Carranza, the Germans had been 
more active since the Armistice than ever before in obtaining control of 
the basic industries of Mexico." 

"The activity of Carranza in driving Americans out and confiscating 
their property is explained by the fact that Germans with plenty of 
money stand ready to pick up the property at bargain rates." 

"According to Dr. Altendorf, the Germans have acquired the titles 
to mines, oil fields, and other properties constituting the bulk of Mexi- 
can wealth, after the titles had been taken away from Americans and 
other foreigners. Almost invariably, he said, Germans got control of the 
properties of Americans, who were slain by Mexicans, who were driven 
from the country, or who were deprived of their titles by chicanery." 

"As soon as the treaty is ratified there will be a hegira of a quarter 
of a million Germans from the United States who will take with them 
to Mexico $400,000,000 capital. There are already 150,000 Germans in 
Mexico and German immigration on a large scale will soon turn the 
country into a German colony." 

"It must not be forgotten that Carranza is the original bolshevist, 
or perhaps he may have gotten the idea from William Bayard Hale and 
Lincoln Steffens and their German friends. ... In fact, there is a great 
deal of circumstantial evidence to show that Germany first instigated 
bolshevism in Mexico to ruin the country so all that was of value could 
be bought in at nominal prices and the way thus paved for the estab- 
lishment of Kultur; and, finding the plan worked beyond the expecta- 
tions, transplanted the devilish virus to Russia." 

It ought not to be necessary to comment on this propaganda. 
Its purpose cannot be mistaken. To anyone even moderately 
informed upon Mexico it convicts its author, his employers, and 
that part of the press which gave it prominence, of deliberate 
conspiracy and fraud. 

Carranza has not driven Americans out of Mexico. He has 
not confiscated any American property and sold it to Germans. 
Germans have not obtained control of any of the basic industries. 
In the oil and mining industries Germans are conspicuous by 
their absence. There are not 150,000 Germans in Mexico or one- 
fifth of that number. No one, of course, can tell how many Ger- 
mans will go from the United States into Mexico, or how much 
money they will carry with them. 

If Germany is held in complete economic and military sub- 
jection to her conquerors for a period of years, as the Peace 
Treaty provides, how can she gain either military or economic 
control of a continent thousands of miles distant, "within six 
months" or any other period? 

21 



Excepting the Spanish, Americans and Britons are the most 
numerous foreign elements in Mexico. It is they who threaten 
to control the basic industries. If the victors of the European 
war, one of them ''mistress of the seas," and another a next-door 
neighbor, find it difficult to make a colony of Mexico, how can 
defeated Germany hope to do it? 

The persons responsible for the fiction that Mexico would 
like to become a colony of Germany are the same who are respon- 
sible for the fiction that Mexico would like to become a colony 
of the United States. There is not a particle of serious evidence 
in favor of either. 

7. 

THE MONROE DOCTRINE ARGUMENT 

The danger from England is far more nearly real. British 
capitalists want the same kind of a government in Mexico as 
American capitalists do, and they are quite willing that we shall 
undertake the expense of establishing it. One of the most shop- 
worn of interventionist arguments is that if we do not take 
military action to "straighten out" Mexico England will do so, 
thereby infringing the Monroe Doctrine and precipitating a 
crisis with ourselves. 

This may be accepted as a possibility. The British Govern- 
ment has repeatedly proven itself capable of exactly the kind of 
an aggression that an expedition ''to protect British lives and 
property" in Mexico would involve. But the military difficul- 
ties of a British conquest, by reason of distance, would be infin- 
itely greater than the difficulties in the way of an American con- 
quest. That is perhaps the reason why England is quite willing 
for America to "attend to her interests" there. Why not wait 
and see if England would consider it practicable to enter upon 
a war of conquest upon Mexico before entering upon such an 
enterprise on England's behalf ourselves? 

Assuming that England would consider it practicable to 
take military action in Mexico, does it follow that we would be 
justified in entering upon a war of conquest simply to prevent 
some other nation from entering upon a war of conquest? 

Would the presence of England in Mexico be a menace to 
the United States? Is Canada a menace? 

22 



Or, if we must have a war over Mexico of some kind, why 
not fight to save Mexico from aggression by others, instead of 
fighting a war of aggression upon her ourselves? 

"If we don't do it, England will!" This is reminiscent of 
the swindler's stereotyped defense: "If I didn't get the sucker's 
money, somebody else would." 

Behold the ancient and venerable document, the Monroe 
Doctrine, brought out of its closet and paraded before us, to 
what end? Not to preserve the independence of Latin American 
States, but to destroy it; not to prevent the absorption of Latin 
America by a foreign power, but to facilitate it — and ourselves 
that foreign power! 

The only escape from this absurdity is through a confession 
that our "unselfish protection" is a monster hypocrisy, that the 
Monroe Doctrine is not for our neighbors, but for ourselves. 

"But the Monroe Doctrine at least requires us to compel Mexico 
to observe her international obligations." 

What obligations? The obligation to pay her external 
debts? The Mexican Government has not repudiated any part 
of its foreign debt. It has only asked its creditors to be patient, 
just as England, France and other debtors of Wall Street are 
doing. The Mexican Government has repeatedly announced its 
determination to pay all legitimate foreign claims of whatever 
kind. A number of our American States have repudiated their 
foreign debts at various times, and the British bondholders are 
still unpaid. Would we consent to a British military occupa- 
tion of the United States for the collection of these debts? What 
other international obligations are specified? There is no other 
obligation except the obligation to apply the laws of the land 
without discrimination against foreigners. This obligation is 
lived up to. In fact, one of the bitterest complaints against 
Carranza is that he refuses to accord foreigners special privi- 
leges, as the Old Regime had done. 

Even should Mexico repudiate her foreign debts and enter 
upon a general policy of nationalization of private property, we 
would not be justified in attacking her. In using force to compel 
Mexico to observe her international obligations we would be 
violating one of our international obligations, an obligation 
greater than any Mexico would infringe — the obligation to re- 
spect Mexican sovereignty. 

23 



If we think it necessary to maintain the Monroe Doctrine 
against England (which we have not always done) we must 
find some other way of doing it than by aggression upon our 
weaker neighbors. 

There is nothing about the Monroe Doctrine that would 
justify us in perpetrating an aggression upon any Latin Amer- 
ican neighbor in order to prevent some other country from per- 
petrating an aggression upon it, or in order to compel it to 
observe so-called international obligations. 

There is, however, a policy, popular in Big Business circles 
and in Democratic and Republican Party camps, which mas- 
querades under the name of the Monroe Doctrine, sometimes 
termed the "new" Monroe Doctrine, which would commit Amer- 
ica to such a course. 

''We want Mexico.^' That is the kernel of the matter, and it 
comes out, at times, in just those words. Which reduces the 
whole argument to a money-making proposition. "We approve 
of the ''new'' Monroe Doclrine; we want to control Mexico because it 
would mean money in our pockets." 

This argument depends for its favor upon a mental con- 
fusion as to the application of the pronoun "we." If We con- 
quered Mexico, a horde of political job-hunters would settle into 
soft nests ; naval and military officers would receive promotion ; 
army and navy contractors would wax fat; existing American 
holdings would increase in value ; opportunities for profit-making 
enterprises would multiply. 

But what would all this mean to the vast majority of the 
American people? '^ 

8. 

OIL WELL PATRIOTISM 

I take the following from the testimony of E. L. Doheny, a 
leading spirit of the National Association for the Protection of 
American Rights in Mexico, and the largest producer of Mex- 
ican oil — Senate Foreign Relations Sub-Committee Hearing on 
Mexican Affairs, Page"254, September 11, 1919: 

"The British Government then saw (when it grabbed Mesopotamia) 
the necessity of holding for its citizens and for the 'glory of the Empire,' 
the great oil resources, even though it had to obtain them by what 

24 



might be considered questionable means, and I say today that the United 
States ought to hold for its industries and for its people — the people who 
use the flivver, as well as the people who ride in the limousine — the 
oil lands that are owned and have been acquired by Americans any* 
where in the world, and they should not be allowed to be confiscated 
by any government, whether it be British, Mexican, or any other." 

This is perhaps as plausible a phrasing as can be of the 
grab-whatever-you-want-wherever-it-is theory of national interest and 
international morality. It involves, however, a number of erron- 
eous assumptions. 

Applied to the matter in hand, it involves, first, the assump- 
tion that Mexican oil is essential to the life of the American 
nation. This assumption is absurd so long as domestic oil is 
exported in large quantities and is wasted in production in very 
much larger quantities. 

In an article in Sperling's Journal, in September, 1919, E. 

Mackay Edgar, a well known international banker of Great 

Britain, remarked : 

"America is rapidly running through her stores of domestic oil. . . . 
More oil has probably run to waste in the United States than has ever 
reached the refiners." 

In a letter to the Westminster Gazette, in the Spring of 1918, 
Viscount Cowdray, the British oil king, said : 

"Experience in America has shown that the policy of uncontrolled 
working, and that on small areas, is a national blunder. Moreover, this 
method of working has produced wild speculation, and has resulted in 
the most deplorable waste." 

We have heard the same kind of thing from American ex- 
perts. Well, if the United States Government "ought to hold 
for its industries and its people" any oil lands anywhere, it would 
seem evident that it ought first to "hold" the lands that are al- 
ready under the American flag, where war is not a part of the 
process; that it ought to look first to the effective conservation 
of the domestic supply, which is being wasted by the very gen- 
tlemen who are urging a great grab from our neighbor. 

The Doheny theory involves, second, the assumption that if 
the production or control of Mexican oil should pass out of the 
hands of American citizens, American industry and American 
automobile owners would in some way be deprived of its use. 

It happens that the percentage of gasoline in Mexican oil 

25 



is small. But that point is of little importance, inasmuch as 
there is no reason to believe that Mexican oil would not still be 
obtainable, and in exactly the same manner as before — by the 
simple process of purchase. 

Supposing that Mexican oil should pass into the hands of 
the Mexican Government, or of Mexicans, what would they do 
with it except to sell it to whomever was willing to pay the 
price? 

Nor is there any reason to believe that the price would be 
higher. Conversely, there is no reason to believe that if the 
Government of the United States should tomorrow grab all of 
Mexico for Doheny and his friends, the price of oil would fall to 
the American consumer by so much as a fraction of one per cent. 

Quite to the contrary, it is more likely that if some of the 
oil resources of the earth were pried loose from Doheny, Stand- 
ard Oil, and their foreign partners, the Rothschilds and the 
Cowdrays — by the Mexican Government or any other factor — 
the monopoly of this commodity might not be so nearly com- 
plete, there might be a little real competition, and the American 
users of the flivver and the limousine might have cheaper oil 
and gasoline. 

There is no need for alarm. So long as petroleum is pro- 
duced in so many quarters of the world, the American people 
may rest assured that it will be available for American use, and 
on terms no less favorable if the sources of supply are owned by 
foreigners than if they are owned by Americans. 

The tactics of the gentlemen who suggest the use of the 
public armed forces to "hold" their claims in foreign lands suf- 
ficiently refute any pretense that they may make of concern for 
the American consumer. For it happens that these gentlemen, 
instead of directing their energies to increasing the supply for 
h.he benefit of the nation, have frequently sought to limit it for the 
sole purpose of increasing their own profits at the expense of the 
rest of us. The very interests which are wont to advocate grab- 
bing the natural resources of other countries "for the use of 
American industry" are the same which favor, and put through, 
protective tariffs and "anti-dumping laws," forcing the American 
consumer to pay them higher prices than he would have to pay 
were free importations permitted from abroad. 

The aim of this fallacious propaganda is to delude the Amer- 

26 



ican people into fancying that the interests of its makers are 
their own, in order that they may be willing to go to war for 
them. It comes down to a question of the wisdom of the policy 
of "protecting American property" abroad with the army and 
navy of the public. 

It is universally assumed, in the propaganda for the aggres- 
sive foreign policy to which Big Business is seeking to commit 
the nation, that the protection of the foreign enterprises of any 
American citizen is to the interest of all American citizens. It 
is assumed that foreign investments are in some way national 
institutions, monuments to the patriotism of their founders, as 
sacred as the very Stars and Stripes themselves. The assump- 
tion is the legitimate offspring of another assumption — that what 
is best for the nation's multi-millionaires is best for the nation. 

Yet it would be difficult to show how the ownership of 
Mexican oil by Mr. Doheny benefits the ordinary American. 
The burden of proof is on the Dohenys, and they have not proved 
the point; they have only affirmed. 

Quite to the contrary, it is much better that Mexican oil 
should be recognized as the property of Mexicans, if ownership 
by Americans would be likely to involve us in war or lead us 
into paths of aggression. So long as American industry is in 
neeed of capital, so long as American railroads are crying for a 
billion dollars a year more capital with which to make necessary 
improvements, so long as our western states plead for capital to 
come and develop their natural resources, no American dollar 
that runs into foreign countries, looking for cheaper labor and 
bigger profits, demanding "preparedness" to protect it, agitating 
for war to make its profits good, can claim to be a patriotic dol- 
lar. On the contrary, every adventuring Wall Street dollar that 
calls back to its army and navy to protect it is a traitor dollar. 

In going to war to "protect American property" in Mexico 
we would spend far more of the people's money than the aggre- 
gate value of all the holdings that the war Was intended to 
protect. 

Would it not be better, then, for the nation to buy out our 
patriotic citizens having investments in Mexico — to pay every 
American dollar back, not merely every dollar that has actually 
been invested, but every dollar that any American might claim 
to have invested, rather than to spend an equal sum and send 

27 



tens of thousands of Americans and Mexicans to their deaths 
besides? 

Of course I am not advocating this alternative. Indeed, it 
is doubtful if the patriotic gentlemen would accept it. They 
would demand pay not only for their investments, but for their 
prospects, which they value even more highly — and for which 
they wish you to risk your skins. What they want is for you to 
risk your skins and your property to protect their prospects, 
under the misapprehension that patriotism demands it. 

The Doheny theory — which is only a form of stating the 
theory of Imperialism — assumes that the national interests are 
something different from what they are. It assumes that inter- 
national law is not what it is. It assumes that the sovereignty 
of a country extends to the persons and property of its citizens ; 
wherever they may be, which is not true. It overlooks the fact 
that Mexico is a sovereign state, and that the Mexican nation, 
acting through the Mexican Government, has first call upon the 
resources of Mexico ; that it has the right to control, tax, or use 
those resources as it sees fit, in accordance with its own views 
of the general welfare, and without dictation or interference 
from any outside power. 

Shorn of all humbug, the Doheny theory amounts to this, 
that the American Government ought to grab for American cap- 
italists anything anywhere that they may happen to lay claim 
to, regardless of the rights or interests either of the American 
people or the people of any other country. 

9. 
PLEDGES OF PRESIDENT AND PEOPLE 

For every interventionist argument there are a number of 
good and sufficient answers. One answer to all of them is the 
book of faith by which we professed to be guided in entering and 
prosecuting the war "to make the world safe for democracy." 

It may be painful at this time to recall the articles of that 
book of faith, as they were enunciated by the President of the 
United States. But whatever discrepancies there may be between 
the President's promises and his performances, and whatever 

28 



may be the causes thereof, the President was not alone in swear- 
ing allegiance to these principles. 

The President's words were endorsed and echoed by every 
one of the rich gentlemen, every one of the newspapers, and 
every one of the politicians who are now asking the country to 
approve a program of intervention in Mexico, as well as by every 
one else who joined in the cry of "Stand Behind the President," 
or participated in any way in the war propaganda. 

Wherefore, any repudiation or belittlement of these prin- 
ciples now by any one who claimed allegiance to them during the 
war would place him in the position of having deliberately parti- 
cipated in another conspiracy of deception, involving the death of 
75,000 young Americans on foreign battlefields and in military 
camps, the grievous maiming of a quarter of a million others, the 
expenditure of thirty odd billions of the people's money, and the 
submission of 100,000,000 to countless forms of suffering and 
sacrifice. 

Who, of these gentlemen of finance, of the press, or of 
politics, dare say that they were only fooling when they told 
us that the War was necessary in order to vindicate the prin- 
ciples of democracy? How would such a statement differ from 
a confession of murder in the first degree? 

Yet it is difficult to see how the advocacy of a war upon 
Mexico, or of any interference in Mexico that might lead to war, 
or of any meddling whatever in the internal affairs of Mexico, is 
anything except just that kind of a confession. So long as inter- 
vention in Mexico is advocated, whether under that name or any 
other, there is every reason and necessity to quote and quote 
again the solemn assurances of principle upon which American 
armies were sent overseas. 

The basic principles of the democracy for which America 
professed to fight were universally declared to be absolute equal- 
ity among nations, great and small ; equal and absolute indepen- 
dence of all in their domestic affairs; the self-determination of 
peoples; the absolute inviolability of sovereignty which is and 
always has been the corner-stone of international law. However 
the phrasing varied, every democratic pronouncement was in 
some sense a reaffirmation of these principles. 

"We are glad ... to fight," announced the President in his 
War Message, "for the rights of nations, great and small and 

29 



the privilege of men everywhere to choose their own way of 
life and obedience ... for the rights and liberties of small 
nations." 

*'We are fighting for the liberty, the self-government, and 
the undictated development of all peoples," he said to Russia 
(May 26, 1917). *'No people must be forced under a sovereignty 
under which it does not wish to live." 

"What we demand in this war," he told Congress, in the 
speech of the Fourteen Points, "is that the world ... be made safe 
for every peace-loving nation, which, like our own, wishes to 
live its own life, determine its own institutions, be assured of 
justice and fair dealing by the other peoples of the world, as 
against force and selfish aggression." 

"Self-determination is not a mere phrase. It is an impera- 
tive principle of action," he announced, in the speech of the Four 
Principles (February 11, 1918). 

Speaking in contemplation of war, in his inaugural address, 
1917, he informed us: 

"These, therefore, are the things we shall stand for, whether in war 
or in peace. . . . That the essential principle of peace is the actual 
equality of nations in all matters of right and privilege." 

"The equality of nations upon which peace must be founded, 
if it is to last, must be an equality of rights," he said, in his Peace 
Without Victory Address. "The guarantees exchanged must 
neither recognize nor imply a difference between big nations and 
small, between those that are powerful and those that are weak." 

In summing up the meaning of the Fourteen Points (Janu- 
ary 8, 1918) he pointed out: 

"An evident principle runs through the whole program I have out- 
lined. It is the principle of justice to all peoples and nationalities, and 
their right to live on equal terms of liberty and safety with one another, 
whether they be strong or weak. Unless this principle be made its 
foundation no part of the structure of international justice can stand. 
The people of the United States could act upon no other principle; and 
and to the vindication of this principle they are ready to devote their 
lives, their honor, and everything that they possess." 

Summing up the pledges enunciated September 27, 1918, 
the President said : 

"They (the issues of the struggle) must be settled . . . definitely 
and once for all and with a full and unequivocal acceptance of the prin- 
ciple that the interest of the weakest is as sacred as the interest of the 
strongest." 

30 



On one occasion he declared : "Our first and primary obliga- 
tion is the maintenance of our own sovereignty." Repeatedly 
he asserted that we were under an equally binding obligation to 
respect the sovereignty of others, and pronounced in most sweep- 
ing terms for the Golden Rule in international affairs. "There is 
not a privilege that we enjoy that we would dream of denying to 
any other nation in the world." "We ask nothing that we are 
not willing to accord." "The basis of honor is . . . the treat- 
ment of others as we would wish to be treated ourselves." 

Far from holding that the Monroe Doctrine gives America 
a right to dictate in the affairs of its neighbors, under any pre- 
text, he asserted that it precluded us, equally with all other 
nations, from exercising such dictation. In the Senate Address on 
the terms of a democratic peace (January 22, 1917) he offered 
this final characterization of his proposals : 

'*I am proposing, as it were, that all nations should henceforth adopt 
the doctrine of President Monroe as the doctrine of the world: that no 
nation should seek to extend its polity over any other nation or people, 
but that every people should be left free to determine its own polity, 
its own way of development, unhindered, unthreatened, unafraid, the 
little way along with the great and powerful." 

At the beginning of 1918 the President put the same senti- 
ment in the form of a pledge to Latin American countries, to be 
transmitted to them by the head of the United Press : 

"She (the United States) is offering in every proposal that she makes 
to give the most sacred pledges on her own part that she will in no case 
be the aggressor against either the political independence or the terri- 
torial integrity of any other State or Nation, at the same time that she 
is proposing AND INSISTING upon similar pledges from all the nations 
of the world." 

Bear in mind that these cannot be taken merely as expres- 
sions of a personal view, as pronouncements of abstract ideals 
to be realized at some indefinite time in the future, as hopes of a 
leader of a political party, or even merely of statements of policy 
of an elected Executive. They are the pledges of a people — 
of every part of the people, at least, that endorsed our "war for 
democracy." They constitute a solemn contract, sealed with the 
^blood of our seventy-five thousand dead, binding the nation 
collectively and individually. 

Not only does the international program to which we pledged 
ourselves in the European war preclude us from any form of 

31 



intervention in Mexico, but previously to the war the present 
Administration had repeatedly invoked every so-called ''Amer- 
ican principle" against such action. 

In an address at Chicago, January 31, 1916, the President 
declared that, by the terms of the Monroe Doctrine, 

**We stand pledged to see that both the continents of America are 
left free to be used by their peoples as those peoples choose to use 
them, under a principle of national sovereignty as absolute and un- 
challenged as our own." 

In the Message to Congress, December 7, 1915, in expound- 
ing the Pan-American Doctrine, he asserted that, ^'All the gov- 
ernments of America stand, so far as we are concerned, upon a footing 
of genuine equality and unquestionad independence^ 

In a speech at Columbus, December 10, 1915, in invoking the 
Virginia Bill of Rights in favor of Mexico, he said : 

^'I find that I am one of the few men of my acqnaintance who abso- 
lutely believe every word, for example, of the Virginia Bill of Rights. 
Most men use them for Fourth of July purposes, and use them very 
handsomely, but I stand before you and tell you that I believe in them. 
For example, the Virginia Bill of Rights — I cite that because it was 
one of the first bills of rights; the others were largely modeled upon it 
or run along the same lines — the Virginia Bill of Rights says that when 
a government proves unsuitable to the life of the people under it (I am 
not quoting the language, but the meaning) they have a right to alter 
or abolish it in any way they please. 

"When things were perhaps more debatable than they are now about 
our immediate neighbor to the south of us, I do not know how many 
men came to me and suggested that the Government of Mexico should 
be altered as we thought it ought to be altered, but being a subscriber 
to the Virginia Bill of Rights, I could not agree with them." 

And again, seven months later, at Detroit (July 10, 1916) : 

"I was trying to expound in another place the other day the long 
way and the short way to get together. The long way is to fight. I have 
heard some gentlemen say they want to help Mexico, and the way they 
propose to help her is to overwhelm her with force. That is the long 
way to help Mexico as well as the wrong way. Because after the fight- 
ing you have a nation full of justified suspicion and animated by well- 
founded hostility and hatred 

"What makes Mexico suspicious of us is that she does not believe 
as yet that we want to serve her. She believes we want to possess her. 
And she has justification for the belief in the way some of our fellow- 
citizens have tried to exploit her privileges and possessions. For my 
part, 1 will not serve the ambitions of those gentlemen. . . . We must 
respect the sovereignty of Mexico. I am one of those — I have some- 
times suspected that there were not many of them — who believe abso- 

32 



lutely in the Virginia Bill of Rights, which says that a people has the 
right to do anything they please with their own country and their own 
government." 

In his original statement to Congress of policy in regard to 

Mexico (August 27, 1913) the President said : 

"It is our purpose, in whatever we do ... to pay the most scrupu- 
lous regard to the sovereignty of Mexico. That we take as a matter of 
course to which we are bound by every obligation of right and honor." 

Repeatedly he pronounced against imperialistic policies as 
un-American, and specifically against the policy of employing 
the public armed forces "for the protection of American prop- 
erty" in neighboring countries. In a speech at Cincinnati, Octo- 
ber 26, 1916, he said : 

"A great many men are complaining . . . that the Government of 
the United States has not the spirit of other governments, which is to 
put the force, the army and navy, of that government, behind invest- 
ments in foreign countries. Just so certainly as you do that you join 
this chaos of competing and hostile ambitions (the European war)." 

And again, in his Speech of Acceptance, 1916: 

"The people of Mexico have not been suffered to own their own 
country or direct their own institutions. Outsiders, men of other nations 
and with interests too often alien to their own, have dictated what their 
privileges and opportunities should be, and who should control their 
land, their lives, and their resources — some of them Americans, pressing 
for things they never could have got in their own country. The Mexican 
people are entitled to attempt their liberty from such influences." 

He even acknowledged Mexico's right to disorder, Mexico's 
right to spill as much blood as she pleased in the process of 
changing her government, Mexico's right to take as long as she 
pleased in effecting changes: 

"It is none of my business, and it is none of your business how long 
they take in determining it (what their government shall be). It is 
none of my business and it is none of your business how they go about 
the business. The country is theirs. . . . Have not European nations 
taken as long as they wanted and split as much blood as they pleased 
in settling their affairs? And shall we deny that to Mexico because she 
is weak? No, I say!" 

Such quotations could be multiplied. They are so well 
known that perhaps I have indulged in them at unnecessary 
length. On the other hand, they cannot be repeated too fre- 
quently so long as Mexico stands in danger from us. Either we 
were despicable hypocrites in the war, or we are hypocrites now 

33 



— those of us who are attempting to fabricate some pretext for 
aggression upon Mexico. 

10. 

THE WILSON POLICY OF INTERVENTION 

Mexico does stand in danger of us, and it is not only because 
our financiers and their press were fooling when they told us 
how they loved democracy, but also because the eminent states- 
man who uttered these solemn pledges is not living up to them, 
has never lived up to them, has never attempted to live up to 
them. 

Without examining into the relationship between the Wilson 
Administration and the intervention conspiracy, it is impossible 
either to appraise the danger of war, or to take effective measures 
to avert it ; it is impossible either to understand the cause of the 
Mexican ''turmoil," or to arrive at the rational solution. 

Neither the wickedness of Carranza nor the depravity of the 
Mexican nation, but the policy of Wilson, is the key to the Mex- 
ican situation. That policy is still very widely misunderstood 
in the United States, and only because it has been consistently 
and almost universally misrepresented by the press, and all other 
agencies under the influence of the interventionists, including the 
Administration itself. This misrepresentation can be explained 
only as an integral part of the intervention conspiracy. 

The Wilson Mexican policy has always been a policy, not of 
non-intervention, but of intervention. One of the lies of the 
intervention propaganda is that Wilson's policy is a policy of 
non-intervention. Any opponent of intervention who repeats 
this lie or assumes it to be a fact, whether out of respect for the 
high office of the President or for any other reason, disarms him- 
self and plays into the hands of the intervention conspirators. 

Military invasion is the most drastic form of intervention. 
The Wilson Administration has perpetrated two protracted in- 
vasions of Mexico, one lasting seven months, and the other 
eleven months, as well as numerous invasions of shorter dura- 
tion, each one legally an act of war. . It has repeatedly threat- 
ened Mexico with force. It holds the threat of force constantly 
over Mexico. Every diplomatic representation involving a 

34 



threat is a form of intervention. Not to speak of aeroplanes, 
which have strangely flown hundreds of miles over Mexican 
territory, not once but many times, American war vessels have 
been held for a long period in Mexican ports in violation of inter- 
national law and over repeated protests of the Mexican govern- 
ment. 

The Villa raid, the President held, was a violation of Mex- 
ican sovereignty; the "punitive expedition," he said, was NOT 
a violation of Mexican sovereignty (Speech of Acceptance, 1916). 
He commanded Huerta to salute the flag, but refused Huerta's 
offer to salute the flag simultaneously with an American salute 
to the Mexican flag. He declined to enter into a reciprocal 
agreement with the Mexican Government, already recognized as 
such, for the crossing of the international line by military forces 
in pursuit of bandits — insisting that American forces should 
cross, but that Mexican forces should not cross under similar 
circumstances. He refused Carranza's request for mediation of 
the difficulties growing out of the "punitive expedition." In 
almost innumerable other ways the President has denied to 
Mexico the "genuine equality," the "unquestioned independ- 
ence," the "scrupulous respect for sovereignty," so frequently 
and solemnly promised. 

The PURPOSE of the Wilson policy is as widely misunder- 
stood as is its essence. To discover the real purpose it is neces- 
sary to look beyond the Wilsonian pronouncements of high in- 
tention, to glance at the subject matter of the various diplomatic 
representations to Mexico, and especially at the EFFECT that 
they, the overt acts, and the other features of the policy tend to 
produce. 

For it happens that, while saying one thing to the American 
people, the President has been saying another thing to Mexico ; 
that, while the opponent of intervention can find a complete vin- 
dication of his position in the words of Wilson, the intervention- 
ist can find as complete vindication of his position in OTHER 
Words of Wilson; that every Wilson quotation herein against 
intervention can be paralleled by another Wilson quotation of a 
diametrically opposite import. Every salient argument of the 
interventionist propaganda reappears, in some form or another, in the 
President's pronouncements attempting to justify his meddling 
policy. 

35 



Wilson words balance Wilson words. It is only the words 
that are backed by ACTION, therefore, that tend to establish 
the Wilson purpose. The Wilson diplomacy has been directed 
toward "protecting the lives and property" of ''nationals" in the 
good old imperialistic way. More, it has tended to bring about 
all the conditions most pleasing to the interventionist. Stopping 
short of a war of conquest, it has tended perfectly to prepare the 
way for such a war — when the time is ripe. The sum and sub- 
stance of the Wilson policy leaves no hope for the opponent of 
intervention, but affords every hope and encouragement to the 
interventionist. 

Although international law is clear that foreigners who 
deliberately remain, for business or other reasons, in areas dis- 
turbed by revolution, must take the same chances as citizens, 
and have no right to demand the armed forces of their home 
governments to protect them ; and although American courts and 
American statemen have frequently acknowledged this principle ; 
and although the President himself applied it to Mexico to the 
extent of advising Americans to leave disturbed districts at 
various times; nevertheless, he has repeatedly threatened Mex- 
ico on behalf of ''American lives." 

I quote him on three widely separated occasions: 

August 27, 1913: 

"You will convey to the authorities the indication that any maltreat- 
ment of Americans would be likely to RAISE THE QUESTION OF 
INTERVENTION." (Instructions dictated by the President and wired 
to all American consuls in Mexico.) 

March 9, 1915: 

"The Government of the United States . . . desires General Obregon 
and General Carranza to know that it has, after mature consideration, 
determined that if . . . Americans should suffer . . . because they fail 
to provide means of protection to life and property, it will hold General 
Obregon and General Carranza personally responsible (and) . . . WILL 
TAKE SUCH MEASURES AS ARE EXPEDIENT TO BRING TO 
ACCOUNT THOSE WHO ARE PERSONALLY RESPONSIBLE.** 
(Note to Carranza.) 

July 22, 1919: 

"Should the lives of American citizens continue to remain unsafe 
and these murders continue by means of the unwillingness or inability 
of the Mexican Government to afford adequate protection, my Govern- 

36 



ment may be forced to ADOPT A RADICAL CHANGE IN ITS POLICY 
WITH REGARD TO MEXICO." (Note to Carranza.) 

Again, although the President repeatedly pronounced 
against intervention on behalf of property interests in general, 
and American property interests in particular, he also repeatedly 
threatened Mexico on behalf of property interests. In a com- 
munication devoted to the question of oil taxes, and to the 
application of Article 27 of the Mexican Constitution, and in 
which the killing of Americans was not mentioned, President 
Wilson notified President Carranza: 

"It becomes the fmiction of the Government of the United States 
... to call the attention of the Mexican Government to the necessity 
which may arise to impel it TO PROTECT THE PROPERTY OF ITS 
CITIZENS IN MEXICO." (Note of April 2, 1918.) 

As it is beyond any probability that the killing of Americans 
in Mexico could suddenly be ended; and as negotiations cover- 
ing a period of six years, involving every form of pressure and 
coercion, have not yet brought President Carranza to the Wilson 
view as to the protection due American property; and as Presi- 
dent Carranza has given every evidence of a determination to 
oppose any more far-reaching violations of Mexican sovereignty 
than have yet been restored to, the publication of the notes of 
April, 1918, and of July, 1919, will have to be accepted as notifi- 
cation to America and to the world that the President is seri- 
ously contemplating war with Mexico. 

The only alternative to this view is that these notes are a 
bluff. But there are many reasons for believing that they are 
not a bluflf. 

To go back, first, to an earlier period, we once sent a "puni- 
tive expedition" to Mexico. It was recalled only after the 
President must have been quite certain that we were about to 
go to war with Germany. Although the President had declared 
that the expedition was "for the sole purpose of taking the ban- 
dit, Villa," it remained in Mexico nine months after the chase of 
Villa had been definitely abandoned. Why? 

The answer was frankly given by Franklin K. Lane, Wil- 
son's Secretary of the Interior, and (Chairman of the Mexican- 
American Joint Commission, at the end of November, 1916, in a 
public statement explaining the American Government posi- 

37 



tion on the question of the withdrawal of the "punitive expedi- 
tion." 

Mr. Lane's position in the Wilson cabinet, the importance 
of his statement, and the fact that it was issued immediately 
after a long conference with the President, make it reasonably 
certain that the views represented were those of the President. 
Although, in explaining the dispatch of the expedition to the 
public (March 25, 1916) the President had warned the country 
against a conspiracy ''for the purpose of bringing about intervention 
in the interest of certain American owners of Mexican properties,^'' and 
had asserted that: ''This object cannot be attained so long as sane 
and honorable men are in control of this government" the Lane state- 
ment is virtually a threat of war in the interest of American 
owners of Mexican properties, and an admission that the troops 
were being retained in Mexico for the very purposes which the 
President had so categorically pronounced against. Read the 
following sentences carefully and see if they do not justify this 
assertion : 

"The border troubles are only symptoms. Mexico needs system 
treatment, not symptom treatment. . . . The world has great respect for 
rights that are vested, and we shall go along with the rest of the world 
in protecting such rights. . . . We shall uphold him (Carranza) if he 
is sensible of the duties of his nation to other nations. Mexico will 
either do right without our help — or with it. This is her choice. ... 
We do not wish to be forced into intervention or any other course until 
this opportunity is exhausted. To this end we must pass from the border 
matters to the conditions of Mexico which affect the lives and property 
of our nationals. These must be made secure. . . . 

"This country is pacific, but it is not pacifist. It will fight willingly 
when it can fight for something worth while. . . . We have jumped only 
two or three of the hurdles. . . . The proposed reduction of the new 
export taxes on ores and bullion and the postponement of the decree as 
to the forfeiture of mineral lands . . . are aU indications of the grow- 
ing desire of the Constitutionalist Government to meet those standards 
which the United States and Europe have a right to expect." 

The Wilson policy of serving vested interests went so far as 
to involve a general opposition to Mexican economic reform. 
Although the President had declared for ''the eighty per cent" 
and had promised : "Eventually I shall fight every one of these men 
(foreign capitalists) who are now seeking to exploit Mexico for their 
own selfish ends. I shall do what I can to keep Mexico from their 
plundering. There shall be no individual exploitation of Mexico if I 
can stop it,'' yet every item of the revolutionary program displeas- 

38 



ing to Wall Street met with official protests, often of a threaten- 
ing nature, from him. 

Although he had diagnosed the cause of Mexican unrest as 
"a fight for the land," and had endorsed that fight, yet from the 
beginning down to the present he has offered representations in 
opposition to the program of land nationalization and distribu- 
tion which the Mexicans have tried to put into effect, as well as 
in opposition to all efforts to assume adequate control of mining, 
oil, and other great industries ; to conserve the natural resources, 
especially in oil ; to revoke invalid and oppressive concessions, to 
effect legal confiscations, to democratize finance, to curb or de- 
stroy the monopolies created by the old regime, or adequately to 
tax or control vested interests anywhere. 

Every such representation involving a threat constituted an 
act of intervention and an effort to over-ride Mexican sovereign- 
ty for purely property reasons. 

The Wilson policy of serving vested interests even went so 
far as to involve a stubborn and prolonged opposition to the 
Mexican party most genuinely committed to reform, and, by the 
same sign, of aid and comfort to counter-revolutionary elements. 

As no other Mexican leader has ever been so violently hated 
and plotted against by the vested interests as Carranza, so none 
— not even Huerta — has met with such embarrassing hostility 
from the Wilson Administration, and there is every reason to 
believe that this hostility was due solely to the unwillingness of 
Carranza to accord to the foreign exploiters of Mexico the guar- 
antees of governmental benevolence which they desired. 

The current falsehood that Carranza owes his tenure to the 
favor of Wilson rests chiefly upon the facts that Wilson did not 
recognize Huerta, that he ultimately recognized Carranza, and 
that on one occasion he permitted Carranza troops to cross Amer- 
ican territory in their campaign against Villa. How fallacious 
the reasoning is can only be disclosed by sketching the relations 
of Wilson to the various Mexican leaders from the beginning. 

11. 
WILSON'S AID TO HUERTA 

There seems to be an almost general belief that Wilson was 
unalterably opposed to Huerta from the first, the reason being 

39 



that, as a democrat, he could not approve of any government 
**stained by blood or supported by anything but the consent of 
the governed." 

This is an error. April 11, 1913, a Washington dispatch to 
%he New York World, said: 

"When asked about it this afternoon, President Wilson said the de 
facto government of Mexico would be recognized as the new Provisional 
Government when it had worked out the problem now before it — the 
establishment of peace." 

May 5, the same paper published a dispatch from its Mexico 

City correspondent, as follows : 

"Negotiations between the State Department at Washington and 
the Mexican foreign ministry regarding recognition of the Huerta Ad- 
ministration have progressed rapidly in the past few days. . . . The 
United States Government demands (among other things) . . . accept- 
ance by Mexico of an international commission to pass upon all claims 
for damages sustained by foreigners . . . since the beginning of the 
revolutionary disorders in the republic." 

Reports of this character also appeared in other papers. 

November 10, confirmation came from England. In a speech on 

that date explaining the British recognition of Huerta, Prime 

Minister Asquith said: 

"We were informed by the Government of the United States that, 
as regarded the recognition of Huerta, no definite answer could be given, 
except that they would wait some time before recognizing him." 

If the President was unalterably opposed to Huerta from the 
beginning, why, for nearly six months, did he retain as ambas- 
sador to the court of Huerta, one Henry Lane Wilson, who had 
assisted in setting up the Huerta regime, and who, so long as he 
remained, was Huerta's most conspicuous apologist and support? 

Why, for 176 days after his inauguration, did the President 
employ his power to embargo arms to assist Huerta in the lat- 
ter's efforts to crush his enemies, and so "work out the problem" 
of peace? 

Although Wilson did not recognize Huerta in Washington, 
he recognized the assassin along the border. Under the orders 
of the Executive, the military patrol, as well as the civil author- 
ities, treated the Huerta government as the lawful government 
of Mexico, while the enemies of Huerta — Carranza and his 
friends — were dealt with as bandits. For 176 days the agents of 
Huerta were permitted to purchase arms in the United States, 

40 



and export them through the regular channels, while the agents 
of Carranza, when caught trying to export arms, were throwti 
into jail and their shipments confiscated. 

At the end of 176 days the President placed an embargo also 
against Huerta, but the policy was still a discrimination against 
Carranza, since Huerta, holding the seaports, was able to pro- 
cure arms from Europe. 

Not until February 3, 1914, eleven months after his inaugur- 
ation, did the President place Carranza on an equal footing with 
Huerta, by lifting the embargo entirely. The President's explan- 
ation of his reasons for lifting the embargo, issued on that date, 
amount to a confession that, for eleven months, while conducting 
a sham battle against Huerta, he had assisted Huerta against 
Carranza by "a departure from the accepted practices of neutrality. ^^ 

From which it must be evident that the "blood-stained gov- 
ernments" pose was an after-thought. 

In any event, that pose could not have been sincere, since 
the President proceeded to recognize blood-stained governments 
set up in other parts of the Western Hemisphere, to employ our 
armed forces to maintain a blood-stained government set up by 
a previous administration in Nicaragua, and himself set up blood- 
stained governments in Haiti and Santo Domingo. 

The President did turn definitely against Huerta in the latter 
part of August. Why? Owing to secret diplomacy, it is impos- 
sible to state the full conditions demanded of Huerta. Subse- 
quent events, added to current reports, justify the inference that 
what Wilson sought was, literally, to "maintain the dignity and 
authority of the United States," as he told Congress when he 
took Vera Cruz— particularly to IMPOSE THE AUTHORITY 
of the United States upon Mexico; to procure from Mexico ac- 
ceptance of the principle of American intervention in Mexican 
affairs. 

Subsequent events began to happen at Nogales, Sonora, at 
the end of November. Carranza was at Nogales. On August 27, 
Wilson had placed an embargo on arms against Huerta. But 
he had omitted to lift the embargo in favor of Carranza. Carranza 
was asking nothing of the Government of the United States ex- 
cept freedom to purchase arms. Carranza was anxious to dispose 
of the "blood-stained government" of Huerta, but Wilson was 
not in a hurry to allow him to do so. Wilson held the screws 

41 



upon both Carranza and Huerta while, through John Lind, he 
attempted to induce Huerta to step down in favor of a Provis- 
ional President whom he himself would approve. Only after 
negotiating with Huerta for more than eight months did Wilson deign 
to turn to Carranza, although the latter was the recognized leader 
of all the Mexican elements then opposed to the ''usurper." 

On the day that John Lind departed from Mexico City, 
having received no reply to his final ultimatum to Huerta, an- 
other private ambassador of Wilson called on Carranza at 
Nogales. Still holding the screws on Carranza, Wilson, through 
William Bayard Hale, attempted to dictate terms to the First 
Chief of the Constitutionalist Party. Although secret diplomacy 
also shrouds the Hale proposals, the reports both from Nogales 
and Washington indicated that upon their acceptance depended 
the recognition of Carranza. Their character may be guessed 
from a statement given out by Carranza: 'We will accept no 
transactions, nor the interference of any nation to regulate Mexico's 
interior conditions" 

That was Carranza^s final answer. The Hale interviews 
were broken ofiP. The Washington atmosphere dropped abruptly. 
Carranza was not recognized. The embargo against him was not 
lifted. 

Instead, an order was issued for his arrest, in case he should 
cross the American line, and shortly afterwards it became known 
that Wilson agents were grooming Villa. 

From Nogales we go to Vera Cruz. We shot up that city, 
killed ten children, six women, and some two hundred men; we 
lost nineteen American boys. Why did we do it? Here is the 
President's explanation to Congress : 

"I, therefore, felt it my duty ... to insist that the flag of 
the United States should be saluted. ... I, therefore, come to 
ask your approval that I should use the armed forces of the 
United States ... to obtain from General Huerta . . . the fullest 
recognition of the rights and dignity of the United States. . . . 
We seek to maintain the dignity and authority of the United 
States." (Message of March 20, 1914.) 

Now what terrible offense required that the flag be saluted? 

Here is the official report of the incident in full, as sent by 

42 



Admiral Mayo to Admiral Fletcher, and transmitted by Fletcher 
to Washington : 

"This forenoon Mexican soldiers arrested paymaster and whale 
boat's crew of Dolphin, part of whom were in boat with flag flying, 
marched them two blocks through streets, then back to boat, and there 
released them. General Zaragoza expressed regret verbally. In view 
of publicity of event I have called for formal disavowal and apology 
(and) punishment of officer in charge of Mexican squad, and salute to 
American flag within 24 hours from 6 p. m. Thursday." 

Tampico was under siege by the Constitutionalist forces at 
the time, and warnings had been issued prohibiting landings at 
the particular dock at which the Americans were arrested. 

Very well, we shot up Vera- Cruz. Carranza protested, and 
President Wilson replied to him as follows : 

"The feelings and intentions of the government in this mat- 
ter . . . are based upon ... a profound interest in the re-establish- 
ment of their (the Mexicans') constitutional system." 

The President's various answers as to why we shot up Vera 
Cruz do not agree with one another. 

Nor do any of those answers agree with the action that the 
President proceeded to take, unless you except the single sen- 
tence : ''We seek to maintain the dignity and authority of the 
United States." 

For the President voiced no more demands that the flag be 
saluted. The flag was never saluted. Nor did he make any other 
demands upon Huerta to obtain from him ''the fullest recogni- 
tion of the rights and dignity of the United States" as a sub- 
stitute for a salute to the flag. 

Evidently the President forgot the flag incident on the very 
day of the attack. There are other reasons for the suspicion that 
he never considered it in any other light than as a subterfuge. 
One of them appears in the Message urging upon Congress the 
repeal of the Canal Tolls Exemption Law, one month and four 
days before the flag incident : 

"I shall not know how to deal with other matters of even 
greater delicacy and nearer consequence if you do not grant it to 
me in ungrudging measure." 

President Wilson never took Congress or the public into his 
confidence as to the meaning of this sentence. Instead, he begged 
that he be not required to explain. Has any other plausible ex- 

43 



planation been suggested than the one that might be expressed 
in these words: 

"/ am planning to invade Mexico. England has agreed that there 
shall be no interference, PROVIDED 1 put through this bill?" 

Vera Cruz was occupied in great haste. The order was 
issued before Congressional authorization had been obtained. 
The haste was explained as due to the President's desire to pre- 
vent two shiploads of arms from reaching Huerta. 

This is perfectly understandable as a maneuver in a general 
campaign to oust Huerta. But the action that followed is diffi- 
cult to explain as a part of such a campaign. For Wilson per- 
mitted Huerta to get the arms. The occupation occurred in 
time to prevent the disembarkation of the arms at Vera Cruz. 
When the munitions ships backed away and sailed for another 
port, Puerto Mexico, Admiral Fletcher wirelessed Washington 
suggesting that he occupy that port also. "No" was the answer 
he received. So our marines, who had killed 200 Mexicans and 
lost 19 of their own number, for the supposed purpose of seizing 
these arms, looked on while the arms were delivered to Huerta. 

Nor does the action which the President proceeded to take 
with regard to Carranza comport either with his message to the 
latter or with the theory that he was concerned solely with rid- 
ring Mexico of Huerta. For the President again clapped down 
his embargo against the land ports, every one of which was now 
in the hands of Carranza ! 

Huerta was still able to procure arms by sea. That the 

new embargo was favorable to Huerta is indicated in a Niagara 

Falls dispatch (from the A-B-C Mediation Conference) June 4: 

"Senor Emilio Rebasa, head of the Mexican (Huerta) delegation, 

was elated today over the news from Washington that the United States 

had declared an embargo on the exportation of mmiitions of war from 

the United States into Mexico." 

Why, after shedding American and Mexican blood to injure 
Huerta, should the President "elate" Huerta's partisans? 

As a matter of fact, did the occupation of Vera Cruz deter- 
mine the fall of Huerta? 

It is almost universally assumed that it did. A glance at 
the war-map (or the news of that day) is sufficient to compel the 
contrary conclusion. The Constitutionalists were in possession 

44 



of all of northern Mexico. Villa had just taken Torreon. Gon- 
zales had taken Victoria and was in the act of taking Monterrey. 
Obregon, in the Northwest, had just won a series of victories. 
Tampico was near the point of surrender. Huerta was already 
doomed. 

There are those, indeed, who hold that the American in- 
vasion gave Huerta a new lease of life. For the first time bona 
fide volunteers came to Huerta's recruiting stations. A member 
of the Huerta cabinet repaired to the penitentiary, made a speech 
to the imprisoned deputies (of the Madero Congress), and set 
them free. 

"If it is a question of supporting Huerta against a foreign 
invasion, then we will support Huerta," these deputies agreed. 

"Had Huerta attacked the Americans we would have sup- 
ported him," one of these deputies told the writer. "But when, 
instead of sending the volunteers toward Vera Cruz, he shipped 
them North, we saw through his game. Had the invasion come 
two months sooner, all Mexico might have combined to resist 
the Americans. As it was, the occupation of Vera Cruz did not 
hasten by a day the fall of Victoriano Huerta." 

Perhaps the final proof that, in going down to Vera Cruz, 
Wilson was not concerned solely with ridding Mexico of Huerta, 
is found in the fact that the expedition lingered after he had gone. 
Huerta fled from Mexico July 15. The evacuation of Vera Cruz 
was not ordered until November 14 — four months later. 

Is it conceivable that Wilson did not go down to Vera Cruz 
either to get the flag saluted, to help the Constitutionalists, or 
even to hurry the fall of Huerta, but that the occupation was 
one maneuver in a scheme to dictate who should succeed Huerta 
— and under what conditions? 

12. 

WILSON AND THE BANDIT VILLA 

In his Message of April 20, the President had said : "If armed 
conflict should unhappily come ... we would be fighting only 
General Huerta." 

Then why that four months? 

45 



For answer, every logical person will look in just one direc- 
tion — at what happened between July and November, 1914. 

In that four months the defection of Villa was accomplished. 
Wilson withdrew from Vera Cruz only after the announcement had 
been blazoned in Washington that the early triumph of Villa was 
assured, 

Americans have short memories. How many have forgotten 
that Pancho Villa, the most ignorant, vain, unprincipled, and 
perverted of all Mexican leaders, a bandit who was able to be- 
come the head of a splendid army only because in the beginning 
he chose to fight on the side of the genuine revolutionists, was 
known for many months, in Washington, along the border, in 
Mexico, and in New York, as the special favorite and protege of 
Wilson ? 

The grooming of Villa had gone on for some time. Since 
Nogales Wilson had been cold to Carranza. Proposals that had 
been rejected by Carranza were now made to Villa — and were 
entertained. Rich Americans complained that they could not 
"do business" with Carranza. But Villa shouted aloud his love 
for Americans, and his determination to give satisfactory pro- 
tection to their property interests. 

While our forces lingered in Vera Cruz, Villa suddenly be- 
came the hero of the Mexican Revolution — on the American side 
of the line. America's most frankly pro-intervention newspaper 
publisher established a news bureau at El Paso, employing three 
writers, who were engaged almost exclusively in sending out 
stories delightfully portraying Villa's exploits. The same pub- 
lisher kept a special correspondent with Villa for more than a 
year, and no secret was made of the fact that this correspondent 
also acted as the ex-bandit's personal press agent. The inter- 
ventionists of today came out for Pancho Villa as *'the strong 
man" who would "set up a stable government" and meet "Mex- 
ico's international obligations." The powerful newspapers which 
touted Villa misrepresented and disparaged Carranza. 

The evidence is overwhelming that, while Wilson held Vera 
Cruz, Villa made his peace with Wilson, with the great foreign 
interests, as well as with at least a fraction of the Mexican reac- 
tionary party known as the "Cientificos," and that his rebellion 
against Carranza was fomented during that period. 

One George C. Carothers, a special agent of Wilson, became 

46 



Villa's chief adviser. Senor Cardoso, a pronounced Clerical, a 
friend of Villa, and a violent enemy of Carranza, became Wilson's 
diplomatic agent at Mexico City. With the assistance of these 
men and other special agents, and under the direction of Bryan, 
the State Department became a pro- Villa anti-Carranza press 
agency. 

An American General carried to Villa the President's assur- 
ance that he would never, under any circumstances, recognize 
Carranza. 

When the Constitutionalist Party failed to go to pieces, as 
expected, Wilson proceeded to assist Villa militantly against it. 
In January (1915) Carranza felt obliged to prohibit the use of 
code messages by Consuls between his territory and territory 
under the control of Villa. It was said that American consular 
agents, acting as Villa spies in the Carranza camps, were abusing 
their privileges to transmit military information, via U. S. code, 
to other consular representatives in the Villa camp, who then 
turned the information over to Villa. 

The following month Carranza was moved to issue a sweep- 
ing order forbidding his military chieftains from having any 
dealings whatever with confidential agents of foreign govern- 
ments. In his explanation of the order, Carranza referred to the 
"painful experience" involving "the defection of General Villa." 
It was said that American consular agents were attempting to 
foment the rebellion of other military leaders of the Constitu- 
tionalist party. 

When, at the end of January, Obregon drove the Villistas 
from Mexico City, the Government of the United States came 
along with a series of demands, protests, threats, and hostile 
maneuvers, calculated to make the Constitutionalist position 
untenable. 

Obregon demanded the surrender of a Spaniard, Angel del 
Caso, one-time Villa agent at Washington, who had taken refuge 
in the Spanish Legation. Backed by Cardoso, Wilson's agent, 
the Spanish Minister refused to surrender the fugitive. Where- 
upon Carranza gave the Spanish Minister, Caro, twenty-four 
hours in which to get out of Mexico. Bryan sent a note, 
threatening "serious consequences," should Caro be expelled. 
Carranza courteously cited an American precedent for his act, 
and proceeded to expel Caro. The latter was taken aboard an 

47 



American man-of-war. A few days later the Spanish Govern- 
ment conceded Carranza's right to expel Caro under the cir- 
cumstances, incidentally exposing the impropriety of the numer- 
ous "rescues" of reactionaries the Administration was at that 
time staging on Mexican soil. 

Carranza was in possession of the Tampico oil region. On 
the arrival of his forces there, the Administration advised the 
oil companies against paying taxes to him, and warned him 
against trying to collect such taxes. In January, Carranza 
placed an embargo on oil shipments, as a means to enforcing 
the collection of taxes. Bryan wired a command to Carranza 
to remove the embargo, threatening "serious consequences." 
American warships were sent to Tampico, and the threat of in- 
tervention made it possible for foreign ships to get away from 
Mexican harbors without the payment of taxes. 

At the same time Wilson was making representations 
against the Carranza oil decree, which embodied the first formal 
move toward conserving the petroleum deposits for the Mexican 
people. He was also making representations against the Car- 
ranza land decree, which embodied the first formal move, on a 
national scale, toward restoring the lands to the Mexican people. 

The Spanish business element had, to a large extent, made 
common cause with Huerta, as had many of the Spanish clergy. 
When Villa made his peace with the Reaction, these elements 
transferred their allegiance to the bandit. Acting under Article 
Thirty-three of the Mexican Constitution, Obregon and Car- 
ranza expelled a number of Spanish priests and other Spaniards. 
Wilson protested violently against action of this sort, and, in 
a second protest, warned Carranza of "the terrible risk" "from 
without" which he ran, by reason of his "contempt for the rights 
and safety of those who represent religion." March 4, Captain 
Williams of the Cruiser Cleveland peremptorily compelled the 
release from the Manzanillo jail of three Spaniards and took 
them on board the Cleveland. 

During this same period, the Constitutionalists confiscated 
the estates of Felix Diaz and other conspicuous plotters of the 
old regime. The Wilson Administration protested against any 
action being taken, "that savors of confiscation." Carranza re- 
plied, asking what our Colonial Revolutionists did with the 
estates of the Tories in Seventy-Six. 

48 



Again, Carranza decreed that customs duties be paid in gold. 
The Administration protested, demanding that they be made 
payable in paper. Carranza replied : ''Kindly look at the back 
of one of your own United States notes." Here is what our 
State Department found: ''This Note is Legal Tender at its 
Face Value for all Debts, Public and Private, except Duties on 
Imports and Interest in the Public Debt." 

Our State Department even attempted to browbeat Car- 
ranza into accepting Villa paper as legal tender. 

During all this time a violent drive for intervention on be- 
half of Villa was being carried on in the American press. 

When General Obregon laid a special tax upon the rich of 
Mexico City — to feed the poor — the protest that came from 
Washington on behalf of rich Americans and other foreigners 
was so threatening that Carranza thought it best to yield. At 
the same time, Wilson, through Bryan, was apologizing pub- 
licly for a similar tax imposed by Villa in Monterrey, which was 
allowed to stand against foreigners as well as Mexicans. 

Having denied to the poor of the Mexican capital the 
emergency relief — the only relief available — we sent a note to 
Carranza, threatening to hold him and General Obregon per- 
sonally responsible should any Americans suffer by reason of 
rioting on the part of the poor! 

More than that, we capitalized the sufferings of the poor 
for the manufacture of interventionist sentiment. The American 
press was filled with inflammatory stories comparing Mexico 
City to the concentration camps of Cuba, and to Pekin during 
the Boxer troubles, and suggesting intervention "for the sake 
of humanity," to "protect American lives and property," or "to 
assist Villa to set up a stable government." 

As all private reports from Mexico City during that period 
were censored, telegrams and even letters, the only source of 
information, for the Government or for the press, was the diplo- 
matic communications of Senor Cardoso. As practically all re- 
ports of this sort emanated from Washington, and as nearly 
all of them showed on their face that they were inspired by the 
State Department, the primary responsibility for the interven- 
tionist storm of February and March, 1915, lies upon the Wilson 
Administration. 

March 5, the State Department formally notified Americans 
to leave Mexico. 

49 



March 6, a communication from Bryan to Carranza con- 
tained an open threat to land marines. "That ought to make 
Carranza sit up and take notice," the British Ambassador glee- 
fully remarked. 

March 8, five more warships were rushed to Mexican waters, 
and the entire Atlantic fleet prepared to weigh anchor at an 
hour's notice. 

March 9, the climax came in the note charging the Consti- 
tutionalist leaders with ''wilfully" bringing about "a deplorable 
situation" in the Mexican capital; threatening to hold General 
Obregon and General Carranza personally responsible for any 
injury to any American there; threatening to take "such meas- 
ures as are expedient to bring to account those who are per- 
sonally responsible for what may occur." 

Of course, Carranza and Obregon could not absolutely guar- 
antee that no American would suffer in the Mexican capital — 
any more than the President could guarantee that a mob would 
not burn a Mexican at the stake in Texas, or that a footpad 
would not shoot down an Englishman in an alley of Washing- 
ton. At a dozen other places besides Mexico City and Vera 
Cruz, American special agents and naval commanders were 
harassing the Constitutionalists. Under the circumstances, 
American newspapers very naturally interpreted the note of 
March 9 as preliminary to acts of war against the party of Car- 
ranza. 

No further action was taken, however; for at this juncture 
Obregon evacuated the capital. As Obregon at once marched 
north into Villa territory, the conclusion is justifiable that the 
evacuation was undertaken to avoid war with the United States. 

Immediately a Villa Government, headed by Garza, was 
again set up in Mexico City. The Brazilian Minister informed 
us that conditions were improved, and the famine relieved, al- 
though the Garza army brought no food whatever into the city 
with it. 

The Garza forces, as they entered the city, killed an Amer- 
ican citizen, John McManus. But nothing was said about the 
great government of the United States "bringing to account 
those who are personally responsible." McManus was killed by 
the enemies of Obregon and Carranza, friends of the Brazilian 
Minister and proteges of Wilson. The little matter was instantly 
arranged by the payment of cash by Villa — and the American 

50 



press pointed to this as proof that Villa was willing "to do the 
right thing." 

The next strikingly unneutral move of the Administration 
would seem to prove beyond any question that it was actuated 
by a determination to place the Villa party in the Mexican capi- 
tal and keep it there. That move was a demand upon Carranza 
to agree to the "neutralization" of Mexico City, as well as of a 
railroad leading to it from the sea. This, of course, would render 
it impossible ever to oust the Villa Party. 

At the same time Wilson was striking hard at the Carranza 
cash-box from behind. A major share of the Constitutionalist 
funds were coming from Yucatan, where the slave kings of hemp 
had remained in control throughout the Madero and Huerta 
regimes, and had been unseated only by the Constitutionalist 
Party, which had freed the slaves. 

The hemp kings timed a counter-revolution perfectly with 
the thrusts of Wilson at Obregon, temporarily regained control, 
and announced their purpose to set up an independent State. 
As one of the measures taken to reduce them, Carranza ordered 
a blockade of the port of Progreso and detailed a gun-boat to 
enforce the order. Wilson notified Carranza that a blockade 
would not be tolerated, and dispatched warships to break the 
blockade. 

The port was kept open, and the slave kings were able to 
import supplies and export hemp. Had they been better pre- 
pared for action, or backed by any considerable fraction of the 
population of Yucatan, the action of Wilson would probably 
have been decisive in their favor — and today Yucatan would be 
a slave State under the "protection" of the United States. By 
a swift operation of land forces, however, the Constitutionalists 
succeeded in regaining control of Yucatan. 

13. 

WHY WILSON FINALLY RECOGNIZED CARRANZA 

All maneuvers of this sort, of course, were flagrant acts of 
intervention. We had no more right then to demand the 
neutralization of Mexico City than we have now to demand the 
neutralization of Cork, and no right whatever to interfere with 
the Progreso blockade. We were simply attempting to impose 

51 



"the dignity and authority of the United States" — our authority 
to determine Mexico's form and personnel of government, with 
a view to meeting the wishes of "American owners of Mexican 
properties." 

For the time Villa was our protege. But Villa was only a 
pawn. While we pushed the fortunes of Villa we also protected 
and encouraged leaders of the old regime who had either come 
to an understanding with Villa, who were trying to do so, or 
who promised to serve our purpose in the event of Villa's failure. 

Before the flight of Huerta we had staged a rescue of Felix 
Diaz, one of the responsible assassins of Madero. Diaz was 
later well received in Washington, where his agents held private 
conferences with members of the Senate Foreign Relations 
Committee. 

During the period in which the Zapatistas were in control 
in Mexico City (January, 1915) Leon Canova, one of Wilson's 
many agents, abused his privilege as a consular representative 
to procure the escape from Mexico of Eduardo Iturbide, one of 
the props of the Huerta regime. 

Canova smuggled Iturbide out of the Mexican capital in a 
Pullman drawing-room, turning the Mexican agents back from 
the door with the declaration that, as a representative of the 
United States, he must be respected, or there would be trouble. 
General Palafox publicly charged Canova and Silliman, another 
Wilson agent, with receiving 500,000 pesos for aiding Iturbide, 
and withdrew the charge only after a formal demand for a re- 
traction by Bryan. 

On arriving in El Paso, Canova flatly denied knowledge of 
the case. A few days later Iturbide told the story of his escape, 
implicating Canova. Canova and Iturbide proceeded together 
to Washington. After "thanking Secretary Bryan for helping 
him to escape from Mexico," in the words of the press dispatches, 
Iturbide opened headquarters in Washington and started vigor- 
ously plotting with Felix Diaz and other elements of the "old- 
time regime." 

The way Canova's unneutral act was regarded by the Ad- 
ministration may be judged by his reward. Canova was pro- 
moted to the head of the Bureau of Mexican Affairs in the State 
Department. 

While Villa was in possession of the Mexican capital, an- 
nouncement was made that the bandit had entered into a tenta- 

52 



tive arrangement with Wall Street for a loan of three hundred 
million pesos. Shortly afterwards, a shipment of between three 
and four million dollars in gold reached Villa from New York. 
At the same time it was announced that the Harriman and Pierce 
interests would be permitted to foreclose on the Mexican Na- 
tional Railways. January 22, 1915, Enrique C. Llorente, Villa's 
confidential agent at Washington, called on Secretary Bryan, 
denounced the land and oil decrees of Carranza, and pledged his 
chief to respect all foreign holdings. 

Villa halted the division of lands in his territory, reversed 
himself on the clerical question, took 1500 ex-Huerta officers 
into his military organization, made his peace with the Terrazas- 
Creels, and established relations with an invisible Junta in New 
York, dominated by the Cientifico section of the Madero family. 

Circumstances of this character, becoming known all over 
Mexico, hurried the dissolution of the Villa coalition, and paved 
the way for the decisive defeat administered at Celaya by Obre- 
gon. Gutierrez, then Zapata, broke with Villa. The Wilson 
help availed nothing, once the peons became aware that Villa 
had been corrupted. When it became evident that the bandit 
was doomed, he was abruptly abandoned by his American God- 
father. 

But, far from cheerfully recognizing Carranza, the President 
produced another trick from his sleeve. 

It was when Villa was at the height of his power, and his 
early triumph expected, that the President delivered his famous 
let - them - take - as - long - as - they - like - and - spill - as - much- 
blood - as - they - please - it's - none - of - our - business speech. 
(Indianapolis, January 8, 1915.) Can it be a mere coincidence 
that he confessed to favoring the opposite policy at precisely the 
juncture when Villa's fortunes were definitely on the wane? 

Of course, the sentiment of the Indianapolis speech was 
never lived up to for a day, as has been seen. But the com- 
munication of June 2 was the most open attempt, to date, to 
justify a general policy of intervention. On June 2, 1915, the 
President sent a letter to all of his consuls, to be circulated 
among Mexicans, declaring Mexico to be "starving and without 
a Government" ; announcing that "the Government of the United 
States . . . must presently do what it has not hitherto done or 
felt at liberty to do, lend its active moral support to some man 
or group of men . . . who can ... set up a government at 

53 



Mexico City which the great powers of the world can recognize 
and deal with" ; asserting that if the "leaders of faction" did not 
promptly unite and act for this purpose, "this government will 
be constrained to decide what means should be employed by the 
United States in order to help Mexico save herself and serve 
her people." 

Following this, the President put forward what was known 
as his "Pan-American scheme." Six Latin-American diplomats 
at Washington were induced to append their names, with that 
of Secretary Lansing, to an "appeal to Generals, Governors, and 
other Mexican leaders," inviting them, in effect, to repudiate 
the political organizations to which they belonged, to repair 
individually to a given spot, and there agree upon a new provi- 
sional Government. 

Villa had been decisively beaten and his splendid army was 
in fragments, never to be brought together again. Zapata's zone 
of operations was always limited. The only organization of 
national scope remaining in the field was the one headed by Car- 
ranza. Under these circumstances, Wilson's "Pan-American 
scheme" was viewed, both in Mexico and in the United States — 
and by the American press — as a last desperate maneuver to 
eliminate Carranza, break up the Constitutionalist Party, and set 
up a conservative government under the tutelage of Wilson. 

The Administration plan, as exploited in the press at the 
time, was to cause the selection of Vasquez Tagle for provi- 
sional President, with the understanding that Iturbide would be 
subsequently "elected" President. Vasquez Tagle was a Cien- 
tifico. He had been a member of the Madero cabinet, the only 
member who had not resigned after the treason of Huerta. Upon 
this fact was based an ingenious argument, widely exploited in 
the press, intended to show that Tagle was logically and legally 
the man to succeed to the Provisional Presidency. Iturbide was 
represented as having been entertained by members of the 
Wilson cabinet and as being the first choice of the Administra- 
tion for the Presidency of Mexico. 

The President's Pan-American scheme failed only because 
every Governor and every General politely replied, referring his 
proposals to Carranza, each refusing to be drawn from his 
allegiance. Although the deliberations of the Pan-American 
diplomats were secret, it was reported that the six Latin-Ameri- 
can Governments unanimously insisted that the only proper 

54 



course open was to recognize Carranza — and that it was due to 
this stand of the Latin-American Governments that the Presi- 
dent reluctantly consented to recognize Carranza. 

Our recognition of Carranza did not, however, by any means 
see the end of the Administration plots against him. 

14. 
WHY "HE KEPT US OUT OF WAR" WITH MEXICO 

The best things that can be said of the Wilson Mexican 
policy are chiefly of a negative character. The President did 
not recognize Huerta. He did not recognize Villa. Ultimately 
each of his various invasions came to an end. His aggressions 
were never carried to the extreme conceivable limit. He never 
fully satisfied the demands of the most passionate and headlong 
of the interventionists. 

It is for this reason that there are perfectly honest persons 
who are still inclined to trust him to continue to "keep us out 
of war" with Mexico. Such confidence is illusory and is perhaps 
the most dangerous factor in the situation. 

For the worst thing that can be said of the Wilson Mexican 
policy is that it unerringly operates to bring about every condi- 
tion which the most violent of the interventionists desire. 

I do not charge that any party to the intervention conspiracy 
wants war merely for the saks of war. What is wanted is pro- 
tection of a highly benevolent character to those who are inter- 
ested in the exploitation of Mexican resources for their own 
private profit. Wall Street wants war only because it despairs 
of procuring the kind of protection it wants without war. 

Even now, if by threats, diplomacy, bribery, or other means 
less drastic than war, Wall Street could be assured of a "stable" 
reactionary government in Mexico, similar to the Diaz autocracy, 
or even a far more liberal government, so long as it is sufficiently 
friendly to "business," it is certain that the National Associa- 
tion for the Protection of American Rights in Mexico would at 
once disband, and the intervention propaganda disappear. 

Again, even the interventionist, however energetically he 
may work for war, does not want war until war can be success- 
fully put over. There are persons who for years have agitated 
for war with Mexico, knowing full well that the time was not 

55 



ripe, but knowing that the dissemination of interventionist pro- 
paganda was one means of ripening the time; knowing, even, 
that criticism of the President, and misrepresentation of his 
policy, was one means of ripening the time. 

The fact that the President has not yet attempted a w^ar 
of conquest on Mexico is no evidence that he will not engage 
in such a w^ar, when the time is ripe. His diplomacy has been 
directed unfalteringly toward protecting vested interests in 
Mexico, and especially toward seeking to set up a government 
satisfactory to vested interests. In pursuance of this end, he has 
threatened war, has perpetrated legal acts of war, has placed 
us in a position w^here war could not have been avoided had the 
Mexican Government been as unyielding in maintaining the 
''dignity and authority" of Mexico on Mexican soil as he in 
maintaining the "dignity and authority" of the United States. 

So, even if we did not have the example of Haiti, Santo 
Domingo, and Nicaragua, before us, we would know that the 
President did not refrain from the extreme step because of any 
question of principle. 

Why, then, have we not yet essayed to conquer Mexico? 

There have been questions of expediency. "Our job" in 
Mexico is not one that can be attended to, as in Haiti, by mere 
fiat of the President, and practically in secret. It must have, 
at least, partially, the backing of public opinion. In 1914, we 
took Vera Cruz under the guns of American battleships. We 
could have held Vera Cruz indefinitely under the guns of Amer- 
ican battleships. But we could not have sent an army on to 
Mexico City. The forces of occupation numbered fewer than 
7,000, and it required several weeks to get that number there. 

In 1914, the United States was blessed with unprepared- 
ness. The army that we had in 1914 was incapable of conquer- 
ing Mexico. We would have had to manufacture an army to 
attempt such a thing — the war would have had to become a 
political question. It happened that the Vera Cruz expedition 
did not excite any wildly warlike spirit in the American people. 
Recruiting in our army and navy did not pick up. Conscription 
in those days was a thing beyond the Ainerican imagination. 
In 1914 we were in a position to meddle and coerce, but not to 
crush. 

In 1915 and 1916, we were engaged in controversies with 
European belligerents. Our pacific and idealistic President 

56 



threatened both sides with war purely on behalf of American 
rights to trade upon the high seas. 

After Wall Street began making great loans to the Entente 
Governments, and so became financially interested in an Entente 
victory, the expediency of avoiding war with Mexico became 
apparent. Although there were those who advocated a war 
upon our neighbor, as a means to building an army in prepara- 
tion for Germany, others pointed out that such a war would 
necessarily turn aside the flow of American munitions from 
Europe, and so jeopardize the interests of the Entente. 

Nevertheless, following the Columbus raid, the "punitive 
expedition" took the field, resulting in the most dangerous Mexi- 
can crisis to date. But even during the "punitive expedition" 
the aggressive spirit of the American people was strangely luke- 
warm. One irritating newspaper hoax after another was pulled 
off, with the evident purpose of stirring the people into a frenzy 
against Mexico. After the Carrizal clash, it is probable that 
there would have been war with Carranza, had not the report 
of an American Captain, written when in the expectation of 
death, come to light in time to prove the Americans the 
aggressors. Even then, an ultimatum was sent to Carranza, who 
avoided war only by surrendering his American prisoners, while 
not raising an issue over Mexican prisoners held by the Ameri- 
can forces. 

An examination of the RESULTS of the Wilson Mexican 
policy will show that, in holding oflf insofar as he has held off, 
the President has proved himself a better friend of the inter- 
ventionists than they themselves are. 

For the final answer to the interventionist philosophy is that 
we ourselves are decisively jesponsible for the so-called Mexican 
problem. In this answer is wrapped up the remedy. We cre- 
ated the conditions which we are now asked to end by interven- 
tion — we meaning, primarily, the financial interests which de- 
mand intervention, and the Wilson Administration, acting in 
cooperation with them. 

If an American Ambassador had not lent his active support 
to the plot against Madero, it is improbable that the latter would 
have been killed, and more improbable that there would have 
been a Huerta problem. The Huerta problem, of course, was 
inherited from the Taft Administration. 

57 



If we had not departed from "the accepted practices of 
neutrality" for eleven months, to assist Huerta against Car- 
ranza, preventing the latter from purchasing arms, there would 
have been no Tampico flag incident and no Vera Cruz occupa- 
tion. Huerta would have been driven out before the date of 
the "insult" to the flag. 

If we had not nursed Villa and then abandoned him, it is 
improbable that there would have been a Columbus raid. The 
vengeful rage which was, at least in part, the acknowledged 
motive for the raid, would have been lacking. 

If we had held to "the accepted practices of neutrality" from 
the first, and permitted the unrestricted export of arms and 
munitions, through the regular channels, to Mexico — as we did 
to European countries — it is reasonably probable that the most 
popular Mexican party would long ago have worked out the 
problem of internal peace, and our most plausible pretext for 
meddling would now be lacking. 

Ever since early in 1913, down to the present writing, the 
Government headed by Carranza has begged this privilege of 
the United States, asserting that it was the one thing necessary 
to put an end to counter-revolution and banditry, and the only 
thing asked of this country. These appeals have been in vain. 

There is no virtue in any theory that the lifting of the em- 
bargo would tend to increase Mexican disorder. The present 
Mexican Government rose to power and maintains itself in spite 
of the embargo handicap. It holds every sea and land port. 
It is not in the smuggling business, while its enemies are. Were 
the embargo raised, there is no reason to believe that the bandits 
would be able to procure any considerable fraction of the arms 
imported. Our present policy is still a "departure from the ac- 
cepted practices of neutrality," in favor of bandits and counter- 
revolutionists. 

Our "punitive expedition" furnished a strange spectacle of 
a powerful Government invading the territory of a weaker 
neighbor to alleviate a condition of lawlessness for which it was 
itself responsible. Having refused Carranza the arms absolutely 
necessary for the effective policing of the border, we justified 
our expedition on the ground that Carranza was incapable of 
effectively policing the border! 

Furthermore, having failed to catch Villa ourselves — having 
given up the chase — we remained month after month in Mexico, 

58 



excusing our stay on the ground that Carranza had failed to 
furnish sufficient guarantees of the protection of the border. At 
the same time we continued to withhold from Carranza the only 
means by which such guarantees could be given — we continued 
to prevent Carranza from procuring arms! 

Why have we had an arms embargo against Mexico almost 
continuously throughout the Administration of President 
Wilson? 

The answer has a thousand times been spread abroad in the 
interventionist press : We ivould only he letting^ the Mexicans get 
guns ivith which to fight us later j'^ 

In other words, the embargo is a measure in anticipation 
of war. Not defensive war, for that is out of the question, but 
aggressive war. 

In continuing the embargo the Administration virtually con- 
fesses that it contemplates further armed invasions of Mexico. 

The arms embargo is an interventionist maneuver purely, 
but it is only one of many factors which the Administration 
employs — whether deliberately for that purpose or not — to nlain- 
tain and aggravate the very conditions which we are asked to 
end by intervention. 

Border raids would not be financed in the hope of provok- 
ing intervention unless we were threatening intervention be- 
cause of border raids. 

Every time we have invaded Mexico it has been a source 
of extreme political embarrassment to Carranza, which his ene- 
mies were quick to take advantage of. One evidence of the 
popularity of the Carranza Government is that it was able to 
continue in power throughout the eleven months of the "punitive 
expedition," in spite of the patriotic passions aroused by the 
presence of an alien army on Mexican soil. 

Every time Carranza has postponed a revolutionary reform, 
in face of American threats, it has been a source of political em- 
barrassment to him. The Mexican people expect their govern- 
ment to realize the high promises of the revolution. 

Every time Carranza has revised his taxation program, or 
remitted a tax, in face of American threats, it has been a source 
of internal disorder. The educational institutions must receive 
their pay, as well as the public offices and the army, or the gov- 
ernment will fall. The railroads must be kept up. Because of 
his unwillingness to accept conditions touching Mexican sover- 

59 



eignty, Carranza has not been able to borrow a dollar abroad. 
Our hostility is primarily responsible for all disorder arising 
from financial difficulties. 

Again, our hostility to the Carranza Government has been 
a source of hope and encouragement to counter-revolutionary 
plots of every kind. 

Our interventionist policy has encouraged American reck- 
lessness of life in Mexico, as well as anti-Carranza propaganda 
and plots by Americans in that country. "/ have been advised 
to leave Mexico, but 1 intend to stay on and insist that my 
home Government protect my property and me."' This senti- 
ment has been repeatedly expressed to the writer by Americans 
in Mexico, even by Americans who were engaged in anti-Car- 
ranza agitation and plots at the time. 

15. 
WILSON, DOHENY, AND PELAEZ 

Coming down to the situation at the end of 1919, our inter- 
ventionist policy has encouraged open and armed defiance of 
Mexican authority by American property-holders, as well as in- 
terventionist propaganda in the United States. 

Both in their authorized propaganda, and in sworn testi- 
mony at Washington, the oil men boast that the Administration is 
fully informed as to their activities, here and in Mexico, ap- 
proves of them, and is cooperating closely with them. This is 
confirmed both by the news of current happenings and by offi- 
cial pronouncements of the Government. 

In a communication denying that the oil companies seek 
intervention, published in the New York Nation, July 26, 1919, 
and signed ''The Association of Oil Producers of Mexico," ap- 
pears the following statement: 

"The oil companies seek only two things, which are recognition of 
their legal rights, and adequate protection for their men in the. field. 
In both these contentions they have the support of the Department of 
State." 

This seems fairly innocent until one looks a little farther. 

We find an admission that the oil companies are supporting a 

rebel army on Mexican soil, and the following assertion is made : 

"Any money paid to Pelaez for the protection of property and to 

prevent destruction has been paid . . . with the full knowledge of the 

Foreign Offices of Great Britain and the United States." 

60 



It is asserted that the payments to Pelaez began because 
of threats to destroy property by Pelaez, and the continuation- 
of the payments is defended on the assumption that, otherwise, 
Pelaez would destroy property. But another object of the pay- 
ments appears from these words : 

" 'King' Pelaez's troops are operating in the oil fields only, 
far from any railroad, for the reason that the government is attempt- 
ing to confiscate their oil values." 

That is to say, the oil men are employing a bandit army to 
defy the Mexican Government, as part of a scheme to prevent 
the application of Mexican laws to the Mexican oil industry. 
Confirming this well known fact, Mr. LaGuardia, of New 
York, in a speech in the House of Representatives, July 10, 1919, 
said: 

"I call your attention to this small strip in red. . . . This is under 
the control of the Pelaez faction. . . . These forces protect the oil in- 
dustries from being robbed by the Carranza faction. It is supported 
and paid for by the oil companies." 

This armed defiance of the Mexican Government, to which 
American oil men make confession, is the result of a controversy 
with the Mexican Government over various purely internal ques- 
tions, involving the imposition of taxes, the question of prior 
rights to the products of the sub-soil, and the question of the 
foreigner's privilege to appeal to his home government for in- 
tervention on behalf of what he considers to be his property 
rights. One of the assertions sent out officially by the National 
Association for the Protection of American Rights in Mexico 
and widely circulated in the press, reads as follows: 

"No foreign corporation or individual can legally acquire or hold 
any mines, oil wells, land, or other real property in Mexico unless he 
renounces his citizenship." 

This purports to be a textual translation of a clause in 
Article 27 of the Mexican Constitution. It is a typical example 
of interventionist falsehood. The Mexican Constitution does 
not require any foreigner to renounce his citizenship, as a con- 
dition to acquiring Mexican property. It requires foreigners 
only to agree "to be considered Mexicans in respect to such prop- 
erty, and accordingly not to invoke the protection of their gov- 
ernments in respect to the same." 

We require the same thing of foreigners in this country, al- 
though it is not in the Constitution. The purpose of the clause 

61 



is to compel aliens to seek the same fountains of justice as 
citizens; that is, the courts, which are open in Mexico the same 
as in the United States. A French wine manufacturer of Cali- 
fornia who feels that his property has been confiscated by the 
prohibition laws may seek justice in American courts, as any 
American may do. We do not permit him to continue making 
wine, while forcing American wine manufacturers out of busi- 
ness. Nor do we permit him to call the French Navy to San 
Francisco harbor, there to train its guns on that port, while the 
French Foreign Office threatens war on behalf of French wine 
"rights" in the United States. 

All questions at issue between the foreign oil corporations 
and the Mexican Government are legal questions which fall into 
the same general category. The author has read the arguments 
on both sides, and the Mexican Government seems clearly to 
have the better case. But it is not a question for the author to 
decide, or for the oil companies to decide, or for the American 
State Department to decide. Although we are all entitled to 
our opinions, we are not entitled to appeal to external force to 
compel acceptance of them by Mexico. It is a question for the 
Mexican courts to decide. Mexican judges are as competent 
and honest as American judges. Th oil companies are wealthy 
enough to hire the best Mexican legal talent. If they cannot get 
what they believe to be their rights from Mexican courts, they, 
nevertheless, have no alternative but to bow to the decision of 
Mexican courts. If they proceed to raise and support armies to 
defy Mexican authority, they become liable to deportation for 
taking part in political affairs, or to prosecution as outlaws and 
rebels. 

If Mexican oil men, or American oil men, attempted to do 
in Texas, Oklahoma, or California, what American oil men are 
doing in Mexico, there would be a few legal hangings of oil men 
in the United States. 

Why, then, does not the Mexican Government proceed more 
vigorously than it has yet done against the American supporters 
of Pelaez? 

The only answer known to the author is that they are being 
protected in their unlawful and rebellious conduct by their home 
governments. 

In the Senate Hearing on Mexican Affairs, September 11, 
1919, we find this colloquy : 

62 



The Chairman. Has our State Department been aware of the fact 
that you have been making payments to Pelaez? 

Mr. Doheny. Yes; not only aware of it, but so far as they could, 
without giving it in writing, they have approved of it. 

Before going farther on Administration complicity in this 
matter, let us glance again at the oil region and see how the oil 
companies' support of Pelaez operates, and the situation which 
it tends to bring about. 

As part of its program of conservation, the Mexican Gov- 
ernment has provided that there shall be no new drillings until 
certain conditions have been complied with and certain pay- 
ments made. The oil operators admit that they have entered 
into an agreement among themselves not to comply with these 
requirements. Under the "protection" of Pelaez, they continue 
drilling, without meeting any of the requirements. 

In some cases the drilling of new wells has been stopped by 
government forces. In "Pelaez territory" it goes merrily on. 
But when the present Government regains control of "Pelaez 
territory" there will be a reckoning. The outlaw wells, under 
the law, are subject to confiscation to the Mexican nation. 
By their own action the oil operators place themselves where 
their interests require, not merely temporary defiance of the 
present Mexican Government, but its overthroiv. The question 
as to whether or not Pelaez would destroy property if they 
ceased paying him becomes immaterial ; they would go on pay- 
ing him solely as an incident in their effort to overthrow the 
Mexican Government. 

From the same Senate Hearing, I quote the following from 
the testimony of Amos L. Beaty, General Counsel and Director 
of the Texas Oil Company (Sept. 18) : 

"On three of these properties we are drilling without pay- 
ment. We are doing this in the face of the warning that the 
Mexican Government has given our company that if a well is 
brought in without payment it will be taken over by the Gov- 
ernment. We are not doing it for the purpose of creating strife. 
We are simply doing it in the certainty of our rights, and 
in the hope that we will ultimately get protection in some way.'' 

The oil operators know very well that Pelaez cannot give 
them permanent protection. With all their support, Pelaez can- 
not alone overthrow the Mexican Government, or even capture 

63 



the port of Tampico, or even maintain himself securely in any 
part of the oil fields. 

THERE IS WHERE FOREIGN GOVERNMENTS 
COME IN. 

In a signed statement, published in the New York Times, 
July 15, 1919, the Association of Oil Producers of Mexico an- 
nounced that the oil men, "'relying on the protection of their gov- 
ernments , refuse to submit to the coercion of confiscatory lawsT 

What reason had the oil men to believe that they could rely 
on the protection of their governments? 

The same association answers in another signed statement, 
published in the Tribune (April 11, 1919): 

"Against this constitutional precept (Article 27), and con- 
fiscatory decrees based on it, the American, French, British, and 
Dutch Governments lodged protests clearly characterizing the 
Mexican program as confiscatory. It was thereafter that the oil 
companies united to protect themselves against spoliation." 

From which it would appear that the oil corporations started 
their rebellion only after being assured of the sympathy of their 
home governments. 

From the testimony of Doheny, Beaty, and others, we learn 
that the Association for Protection of American Rights in Mex- 
ico was the outgrowth of a series of meetings held by oil men 
in New York, as a result of the decree of February 19, 1918. 
It was this decree that brought out the note of April 2, 1918, in 
which the Government of the United States called the attention 
of the Mexican Government "^o the necessity which may arise to 
impel it to protect the property of its citizens in Mexico*^ 

In his testimony Mr. Doheny refers to ''the dispute between 
the oil companies and the United States Government, on the one hand, 
and the Mexican Government, on the other." Other oil men men- 
tion the issue in similar terms. Finally (Page 267) Mr. Doheny 
testifies that the oil companies refused to comply with the decree 
of February 19, 1918, ''with the consent and approval, and at the 
suggestion, of our own State Department." 

Which would seem to convict the Wilson Administration 
of being the determining factor in the launching of the oil cor- 
porations' rebellion against the Mexican Government. 

In the communication of April 11, the Association of Oil 
Producers of Mexico also said : 

64 



"A few American periodicals, including 'The Nation,' have aligned 
themselves on the side of the Carranza Government, and therefore in 
opposition to their own. The Carranza Government will not insist upon 
its plan of confiscation if it is convinced that foreign nations will insist 
upon the observance by Mexico of the precedents of international laws. 
The only certain way to bring about intervention is to create in this 
country a divided opinion as to the propriety of the Mexican pro- 
gramme of confiscation, which will encourage the Mexicans to put it 
into effect." 

What does this mean except that the government of the 
United States has assured the oil kings that they will be suc- 
cessful in their rebellion against the Mexican Government, even 
if it requires the employment of American armies to make good the 
assurance? 

16. 

MANEUVERING FOR WAR 

We have been taking, to a considerable extent, the word of 
the oil men on these matters. But the Government of the 
United States has not prosecuted any oil operator for perjury 
nor in any way contradicted what they have said as to its under- 
standing and cooperation with them. 

Moreover, the word of the oil men is supported by circum- 
stances almost too numerous to mention. It is supported by the 
Note of April 2, 1918. It is supported by the earlier record of 
the Administration, which I have outlined. It is supported by 
official pronouncements and news reports down to the present 
writing. 

Although, during the war, we asserted our right to embargo 
any commodities we cared to embargo, we denied the same 
right to Mexico. April 12, 1917, we were informed from Wash- 
ington that an oil embargo contemplated by Carranza would not 
be put into effect. "Definite assurances received by the State 
D:epartment," said The Times report, "relieves a very delicate 
and serious situation." It was reported that British officials had 
asserted that England would not tolerate a Mexican embargo, 
and that it would be considered an unneutral act by both Eng- 
land and America. 

August 15, 1918, we were informed that the United States 
and Great Britain had ''joined in diplomatic representations to 
the Mexican Government against the oil land decrees of Presi- 

65 



\ dent Carranza." Two days later we were informed that a 
"threatened crisis in relations between Mexico and the Entente 
i allies and the United States had apparently been averted" by the 
' modification of one of these decrees. 

Meanwhile, American warships were continuously main- 
tained in the Tampico harbor. April 12, 1919, Colonel James R. 
McLean of the British army, who was reported as being on his 
way to Mexico, on a diplomatic mission relating to oil, said in 
an interview at New York: "Carranza will talk now, because 
he is frightened. If the United States would send some of its 
new ships into the Gulf of Mexico and let their shadows fall on 
Mexican soil, it would clarify the situation." The shadows of 
American warships were then on Mexican soil and had been for 
a long time. February 6, 1919, Ambassador Fletcher asserted 
that no decrees had as yet been enforced and no taxes collected 
under Article 27 of the new Constitution. The repeated post- 
ponement of the application of the decrees can only be due to an 
earnest desire of the Mexican Government to avoid war. 

Again, the word of the oil men is supported by the Note of 
July 22, 1919, threatening a "radical change of policy" because 
of the lack of protection given to American lives in the oil 
region. Singular disorder in the oil region would inevitably re- 
sult from the state of War between government forces and the 
rebel forces supported by the oil corporation. 

The oil men are not satisfied with the "protection" for 
which they pay Pelaez, but appeal to their home government 
for further protection. It is obvious that the Pelaez "protection" 
does not safeguard American lives, but only adds to the danger, 
especially as Americans are continually traveling over hostile 
ground. It is obvious that the Mexican Government cannot 
guarantee the safety of Americans either in "Pelaez territory" 
or anywhere in the zone between "Pelaez territory" and Gov- 
ernment territory, and should not be asked to do so. It is obvi- 
ous that when a Carranza force scatters a Pelaez force there is 
certain to be some indiscriminate looting and killing by the 
fugitives. 

It is obvious that if Carranza should make a serious eflFort 
to destroy Pelaez the temporary danger to American lives and 
property would vastly increase. Somebody might touch off an 

66 



oil well. What would the warships in the Tampico harbor do 
then? 

Carranza is not making a serious effort to destroy Pelaez. 
The attitude of the Government of the United States justifies 
a fear that such an effort would result in another invasion "to 
protect American lives and property." The secret of the sec- 
urity of Pelaez is revealed. It is the same as the secret of the 
postponement of the application of the oil decrees. The cat is out 
of the bag. By our threat of force we have not only halted the 
economic program of the Mexican revolution, but have stopped 
its military operations against the bandits. American interven- 
tion is already here. It holds Carranza in a dilemma where 
there seems to be no choice except between defensive war and 
surrender to the authority of the Wilson Administration to dic- 
tate Mexican oil legislation. 

Again, the word of the oil men is confirmed by an official 
explanation of our arms embargo, given by our Ambassador, 
Mr. Fletcher, recently. The argument is the same as that of all 
interventionists, that if we permitted arms to go to Carranza 
they would be "more apt" to be used against us than against 
bandits. It amounts to a confession that if Carranza does not 
yield in the matter of oil legislation we intend to give him a 
chance to defend Mexico against us. 

To make sure that Carranza may not procure the arms with 
which to defend Mexico against us, we have even sought, by 
diplomatic representation, to prevent their export to Mexico 
from other countries. This is itself an offense which, were the 
tables reversed, would probably be considered by our cheerful 
jingoes as good cause for a Declaration of War. 

The word of the oil men is confirmed by other circumstances 
still. Something happened at Paris. Exactly what happened 
at Paris may forever remain "an international secret" (to em- 
ploy the President's own phrase) of the President's open diplo- 
macy. 

But we know a few things which may form the basis of a 
reasonable guess. At the end of January (1919) a committee 
representing the National Association for the Protection of 
American Rights in Mexico in general, and the copper and oil 
interests in particular, sailed for Europe. The committee was 

67 



headed by E. L. Doheny, January 23, just before leaving, Mr. 
Doheny gave an interview : 

"We go to Europe as representatives of five groups of American 
business men in Mexico, mining, agricultural, and cattle, banking and 
securities, petroleum and industrial. * *We merely go to ask a big 
question. We have hopes that the Peace Conference may see fit to 
answer it. * * How far may new governments go in ignoring or con- 
fiscating the vested rights of foreign inhabitants and of foreigners in the 
lands where the new governments are established?" 

Notwithstanding this statement, the committee was allowed 
to sail. It was the acknowledged policy of the administra- 
tion at the time not to permit any one to leave the country whose 
business had not been examined into by it and approved by it. 

January 26, Ambassador Fletcher was reported as coming 
from Mexico with Mexican data for the Peace Conference. Mr. 
Fletcher came, but did not return to Mexico. At the end of the 
year, he has not yet returned. 

At Paris, Senor Pani, Carranza's Minister to France, was 
not permitted to present his credentials ; nor was he received by 
the Peace Conference. Instead, we were told that Senor de la 
Barra "represented Mexico" at the Peace Conference. De la 
Barra had been a member of the Diaz Government, a Cientifico, 
an attorney for Wall Street interests, a capitalist, and had often 
been mentioned as a favored American choice for President of 
Mexico. In August, the French Government awarded de la 
Barra a Medal of Public Gratitude upon the recommendation 
of Foreign Minister Pichon. 

We do not know what Mr. Doheny had to do with this pec- 
uliar action. But we do know that there has been 
effected an important merger of British, Dutch, French, 
and American oil interests. We know that Thomas W. Lamont, 
a partner of J. P. Morgan & Co., while acting as a Government 
official at the Peace Conference, not only participated in the for- 
mation of the international banking consortium, but also in the 
formation of an international committee of twenty bankers 
"for the purpose of protecting, the holders of securities of the Mexican 
Republic and of the various railway lines of Mexico, and generally 
such other enterprises as have their field of action in Mexico" — 
to quote the words of the announcement issued from the New 
York office of J. P. Morgan & Co. 

68 



We know also that a committee of oil men and bankers held 
a series of conferences with the State Department in July re- 
garding the Mexican situation and were reported as "gratified 
with the outcome of the conferences." We know that thereafter 
the formation of the Mexico International Corporation was an- 
nounced, a financial merger of all the great Mexican interests — 
just as the National Association for the Protection of American 
Rights in Mexico is a publicity merger of the same interests; 
that there was immediately a great activity in all kinds of Mexi- 
can securities; that unauthorized reports continually appeared 
in print, to the effect that an understanding had been reached in 
Paris looking toward the "clean-up" of Mexico ; that within that 
period the greatest of our interventionist drives was launched. 

Were any further confirmation needed of Administration 
participation in the intervention conspiracy it would be found 
in its active cooperation in the propaganda itself. When the 
organization of the National Association for the Protection of 
American Rights in Mexico was under consideration, a commit- 
tee of its promo'ters conferred with the State Department. 
Acting Secretary Polk "both welcomed and approved of" the 
plan, according to a written report of the committee. 

Testifying to this effect, C. H. Boynton, continued : 

"Later a larger committee came to Washington and presented the 
plans of the organization to Mr. Fletcher. . . . From that day on the 
bulletins of the Association and a knowledge of its activities have gone 
to officials of the State Department, and up to this minute I have never 
received from any government official or from any one who was in a 
position of authority . . . the slightest intimation that there has been a 
thing done that was . . . objectionable to the Administration." 

The full meaning of this can be appreciated only by an ex- 
amination of the propaganda of the National Association for the 
Protection of American Rights in Mexico. 

Further, the State Department actively assisted by becom- 
ing, as in years past, a source of many of the inflammatory, ex- 
aggerated, and frequently untrue "news" stories which went the 
rounds of the press. It assisted by issuing passports freely to 
writers devoted to the intervention propaganda, while withhold- 
ing passports to known anti-interventionists. 

The lying Altendorf revelations reached the public only 
through the cooperation of the War Department. Altendorf waa 

69 



permitted to resign from the Army Intelligence Service to be- 
come a press agent of the National Association for the Protec- 
tion of American Rights in Mexico. The "revelations" them- 
selves were put out with what amounted to an endorsement of 
the Intelligence Department. General Churchill was represented 
as vouching for the '"trustworthiness" of Altendorf, and the De- 
partment as "confirming" his story. 

Upon the War Department also lies the responsibility for 
the wide circulation of a map, representing the enemies of the 
Mexican Government as controlling more than one-half of 
Mexico. According to this map, practically the whole of the 
State of Chihuahua, including the cities of Chihuahua and Juarez, 
is in the hands of the Villistas ; nearly all of Sonora, including 
the port of Guaymas, is in the hands of the Yaqui Indians ; nearly 
all of Oaxaca, including the city of Oaxaca and the port of 
Salina Cruz, is in the hands of Felicistas and Meixuerio ; a great 
part of the States Tamaulipas and Vera Cruz, including the port 
of Tampico, is in the hands of Felicistas and Pelaez ; and nearly 
all of Lower California is in rebellion under Cantu. 

The War Department surely knows — and nearly every 
newspaper which published this lying map surely knows — that 
it is four years since the Villistas were in possession either of 
Chihuahua City or Juarez, that the Yaqui Indians have never 
been in possession of Guaymas, that Carranza has for nearly 
four years been in continuous possession of Salina Cruz and 
Oaxaca, that neither Pelaez nor the Felicistas have ever been 
in possession of Tampico ; that it has been at least three years 
since the tale that Cantu was in rebellion against Carranza was 
exploded. 

The promoters and organizers of the National Association 
for the Protection of American Rights in Mexico have made it 
very clear that they feel assured that the decisive Government 
action which they decline to term intervention awaits only a 
properly prepared public opinion. 

17. 

THE SOLUTION OF THE MEXICAN "PROBLEM" 

However well one may understand the motives of Wall 
Street, so long as he misunderstands the motives of the Admin- 

70 



istration he is lulled into a false security from which he cannot 
be awakened until it is too late. 

So long as the public credits the Administration with the 
high purposes which it claims for itself, it cannot believe the 
Administration capable of an injustice against Mexico — and 
when the latter proposes an injustice, the public may readily be 
persuaded to view it as justice. 

Just so long will America be in danger of embarking upon 
U brutal aggression in the guise of a shining mission of mercy. 

A war upon Mexico cannot be brought about by the Wall 
Street gentlemen except as they operate through the Administra- 
tion at Washington. The present crisis could not have 
been brought about except through cooperation between these 
gentlemen and the Administration of Wilson. The interven- 
tionist propaganda would be of no more importance than 
a jackal's howl did not the interventionists have the cooperation 
of the Government of the United States. 

The sad truth is that the Administration of Woodrow Wilson 
is committed to a policy which must inevitably result, if contin- 
ued, in one of two things: (1) The acceptance by Mexico, under 
threat of war, of the authority of the United States to dictate 
Mexico's internal policies; (2) an American war of aggression 
to impose acceptance of such authority. 

The prosecution of this policy has produced the oil crisis, 
which is as sharp as can be without actual hostilities between the 
two countries. Although, by postponing its program of reform, 
the Mexican Government has postponed hostilities again and 
again, it has neither abandoned that program nor conceded the 
authority of the United States to insist upon its abandonment. 
It has never yielded in principle, and it appears to be unwilling 
to yield sufficiently to satisfy those who hold the reins here. 

I quote from a Message of Carranza, September 1, 1919: 

"Unfortunately, the Mexican Government has received suggestions 
from the United States Government when it has tried to make reforms 
that may injure American citizens. These suggestions destroy deliber- 
ately our liberty for legislation, and nullify the right we have to pro- 
gress in accordance with our ideas. The argument used by the Ameri- 
can State Department, as well as by the American press, has been that 
our duties are confiscatory. The Mexican Government hopes the North- 
em Republic will respect the sovereignty and independence of Mexico. 
To violate them, claiming the lack of guarantees for its citizens, or in- 

71 



convenient legislation for its interests, would constitute a transgression 
of international right, and would demonstrate that the worst misfortune 
for a nation is to be weak and unable to protect itself against stronger 
nations. * * The revolution has implanted reforms making for the wel- 
fare and progress of the Mexican people. The Government is endeavor- 
ing to respect and consolidate existing rights, but absolutely cannot 
accept the principle that the liberty of Mexicans to govern according 
to their own necessities should be limited. Our willingness to concili- 
ate in an effort to conquer difficulties that arise will continue, but our 
sovereignty will be maintained.** 

The facts being as they are, the only rational course is to 
appeal over the head of the Wilson Administration to the Amer- 
ican people — to appeal to public opinion to pronounce against 
the purely imperialistic policy which is being followed with 
regard to Mexico. 

Not that this is peculiarly a policy of Wilson, or of the 
Democratic Party. It is a policy that has taken hold of the 
dominant element in both parties. Were a Republican Admin- 
istration in power, the situation would be much the same; the 
danger would be as great provided the Republican Administra- 
tion concealed its real purposes as well, which is unlikely. At- 
tention is directed here to what a Democratic Administration 
has done because a Democratic Executive still holds the reins — 
and of the three Departments of Government, the Executive 
happens to wield overwhelmingly the decisive power, especially 
in the choice of foreign policy. 

Against the terrific forces that are bent upon Mexican ag- 
gression, public opinion, unorganized and inarticulate, would 
have a faint chance indeed, were the enterprise a less ambitious 
one. Were the Mexican "job" as small as the Santo Domingan 
"job" it would have been well under way long ago. But Mexico 
is one of the strongest countries ever to be threatened with 
purely imperialistic conquest. The probable cost in men and 
money alone is sufficient to cause any but madmen to hesitate. 
But it appears that Wall Street has gone quite mad with a lust 
for spoils, and our politicians quite mad with serving Wall Street. 

To "straighten out" Mexico we would probably have to clap 
on conscription again, float more bond issues, set again in full 
swing the vast machinery of war-time restriction. The practical 
difficulties in the way of launching the enterprise are such that 
it is not Utopian to hope that public opinion may yet be decisive 
to prevent it. 

72 



Intervention is not defensible on any ground. It is bad 
democracy. For all of us except a handful, it is bad business. 
It is impossible to exaggerate the probable disaster to both 
countries. Not only would the Mexican people pay, but the 
American people would pay — in blood, taxes, higher living costs, 
in the friendship of our neighbors, in the Constitutional liberties 
of which peoples are invariably robbed in war-time, in our own 
character, in all the elements that make for a higher civilization 
and for world peace. 

In the cause of the Mexican "problem" is found its solution. 
As our meddling has been a decisive factor in creating and pro- 
longing the disorder, and in subjecting Americans to danger, so 
an opposite policy would tend to produce the opposite result. 
We must stop threatening Mexico, stop invading Mexico, stop 
embargoing Mexico, enter into a fair agreement for policing the 
border, keep a few of our fine promises, make a fair trial of treat- 
ing our neighbor as an equal. 

The question would remain as to what the Mexican Govern- 
ment would do to the great property interests which we are told 
are in jeopardy. The Mexican Government has asserted that it 
does not intend to confiscate them. But supposing it should 
confiscate them. Then let it confiscate them. The interests of 
the American people are not the interests of the oil corporations 
in this matter. They are, rather, the interests of the Mexican 
people. The progress of reform anywhere is marked by the sur- 
render of the privileges of a few in deference to the necessities 
of the many. Perhaps some American would really suffer. But 
the Americans who are interested in the exploitation of Mexican 
oil are, for the most part, millionaires with great holdings else- 
where. Were they dispossessed in Mexico, A\^ithout a dollar 
of compensation, they would not forego any luxury; nor would 
their families starve. There may be foreign "rights" in Mexico. 
But how about the rights of Mexicans? Great public works, 
serviceable to the Mexican nation, education, improvement, ma- 
terial and moral rehabilitation, await only the necessary funds. 
Mexico has both the legal and moral right to tax such funds 
from the rich holdings in her natural resources. The vested in- 
terests of a minority, whether native or foreign, cannot stand 
against the needs of the great majority. It is more to the inter- 

71 



est of the American people that their neighbors should have 
decent homes, decent wages, public education, and progressive, 
'institutions of their own making, than that American oil 
gamblers should carry out their schemes. 

I plead for the right of the Mexican Government, undoubt- 
edly supported in its policies by a large proportion of Mexicans, 
honestly seeking to serve the Mexican masses, to make such 
disposition as it sees fit of Mexican oil, regardless of the resulta 
to Wall Street. 




74 



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THE RAND BOOK STORE will be glad to take 
subscriptions for all magazines and newspapers pub- 
lished in the United States and Europe, and assures 
prompt service. 

INCOME DEVOTED TO EDUCATION 

The patrons of THE RAND BOOK STORE give 
substantial support to radical education since all the 
profit is turned over to The Rand School of Social 
Science, the only Socialist Training School for the 
working class in America. 



Study Socialism By Mail! 

THE RAND SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCE 

Offers Two New Correspondence Courses! 



The Human Element in Economics 

By 

SCOTT NEARING 

Three months' course. Examinations. Text-books. 

Fee $5.00. 

Special rates for groups. 



The Fundamentals of Socialism 

By 

DAVID P. BERENBERG 

Three months' course. Examinations. Text-books. 

Fee $4.00. 

Special rates for groups. 



FOUR OTHER COURSES 

In 

History, Socialism, Economics 

For further information write to 

DAVID P. BERENBERG 

Rand School Correspondence Department 

7 East 15th Street, New York City 



THE RAND SCHOOL 
OF SOCIAL SCIENCE 



Local Department Correspondence Dept. 

Full-Time Department Research Department 

Library and Reading Room 

ALGERNON LEE, BERTHA H. MAILLY, 

Educational Director Executive Secretary- 



Courses in Industrial and Political History, Civics, 
Economics, Labor Problems, Social Legislation, 
Socialist Theory, and Practical Organization 
Methods, Public Speaking, English, etc., etc. 



Established in 1906 



Write for Bulletin and full information. Enclosure of 
stamps for reply will be greatly appreciated. 

Address: 7 East 15th Street, New York. 






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Publications 

of 
The Rand School of Social Science 



Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels 10c 

American Labor Year Book (1919-1920) 

(Edited by Trachtenberg) Cloth, $2.00 

Soviets at Work Lenin 10c 

Socialism Sunmied Up Hillquit 10c 

Work and Pay Nearing 10c 

The Coal Question Nearing 10c 

Woman of the Future Lilienthal 10c 

Scott Nearing's Address to the Jury 5c 

Labor and the League of Nations Nearing 10c 

From Fireside to Factory Lilienthal 10c 

American Socialists and the War (Edited by 

Trachtenberg) 10c 

Must We Arm 10c 

(Debate — Hillquit-Gardner) 

Public Ownership Throughout the World.Xaidler 10c 

Food and the People Waldman 10c 

Socialists in the New York Assembly, 

Claessens and Feigenbaum 25c 

The Socialists in the Board of Aldermen (N. Y.), 

Clark and Solomon 10c 

Socialism Berenberg 10c 

Germany and Russia at Brest-Litovsk Magnes $1.00 

Sunday School Curriculum Greenberg 50c 

Bolsheviks and Soviets Williams 10c \ 

Trial of Scott Nearing and The American Socialist \ 

Society Paper, 50c Cloth, $1.00 >J 

Memoirs of the Russian Revolution,....Lemonosoff 35c ^ 

Address All Communications Concerning Books To 

RAND BOOK STORE 

7 East 15th St., New York City ^'^- > 



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